For over twenty years now I study early lexical development in typically developing children who acquire Hebrew as a first language. My current research efforts focus at identifying relationships between communication in the first year of life and the transition to conventional language. Research topics include: Developing research tools for the evaluation of Mother - Child Interaction in the first year of life; Measures of babies’ pre-linguistic abilities; Relationships between communication at 12 months and lexical development in the second year of life; Word meaning acquisition.

In English and in other Germanic languages grammatical morphology represents an area of special difficulty for children with SLI. Therefore, morphology may be used as a clinical marker for SLI in such languages. Inflectional morphology in Hebrew has not found to be exceptionally difficult for SLI children (Dromi, Leonard & Blass, 2002). My current research efforts are directed at identifying a clinical marker for HSLI. The study is theoretically important and it also has a direct clinical implication for the identification of children who are suspected as HSLI and who need language intervention.

Kesher early intervention program was initially developed for 0-7 years old deaf children and their families. This program is based on psycholinguistic theories of language development by hearing children, and on available findings on the development of Hebrew as a mother tongue. Kesher is a homonym in Hebrew that carries several meanings: connection, relatedness, a message, a tie, and a conspiracy. Since 1999, Kesher project has been implemented in all preschool programs for deaf children in Israel, and at present the program is modified for implementation with other populations with special educational needs. The Kesher research team develops and experimentally tests language assessment tools, various language intervention procedures, and learning materials, as well as instructional materials for parents, teachers, and language clinicians in Israel.

Dromi, E. Early lexical development. London: Cambridge University Press, 1987

Dromi, E. Early lexical development. San Diego, California: Singular Publishing Group Inc. (2nd Edition), 1996.

Dromi, E. & Ringwald Frimerman, D. Communication and language intervention with hearing impaired children: The prelinguistic stage. Tel Aviv, Israel: Tel Aviv University: Ramot, 1996. (Hebrew).

Dromi, E. & Ingber, S. (1999). Israeli mothers' expectations from early intervention with their preschool deaf children. Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education, 4, 50-68.

Tur-Kaspa, H. & Dromi, E. (1999). Spoken and written language assessment of orally trained children with hearing loss: Syntactic structures and deviations. The Volta Review, 100(3), 186-202.

Dromi, E., Leonard, L.B., Adam, G. & Zadoneisky-Ehrlich, S. (1999).Verb agreement morphology in Hebrew speaking children with specific language impairment. Journal of Speech, Language and Hearing Research, 42 (6), 1414-1431.

Maital, S., Dromi, E. Sagi, A. & Bornstein, M. H. (2000). The Hebrew Communicative Development Inventory: Language specific properties and cross-linguistic generalizations, Journal of Child Language, 27, 1-25.

Leonard, L.B., Dromi, E., Adam, G. & Zadoneisky-Erlich, S. (2000). Tense and finiteness in the speech of children with Specific Language Impairment acquiring Hebrew. International Journal of Language and Communication Disorders , 35, 319-335.

Tur-Kaspa, H. & Dromi, E. (2001). Grammatical Deviations in the spoken and written language of Hebrew - speaking Children with Hearing Impairment. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools., Vol. 32, 79-89.

Owen, A.J., Dromi, E., & Leonard, L. B., (2001). The Phonology-Morphology Interface in the Speech of Hebrew-Speaking Children with Specific Language Impairment, Journal of Communication Disorders, 34 (4) 323-337.

Dromi, E. (In Press). Assessment of pre-linguistic behaviors in deaf children: Parents as collaborators. Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education.

Dromi, E. & Blass, A., (In Press). The spontaneous use of Hebrew verb forms by Israeli preschool children with and without SLI. special issue on Unity and Diversity in Communication, Edited by Leonor Scliar-Cabral. Journal Ilha do Desterro. A Journal of English Language, Literature in English and Cultural Studies.

Dromi, E. (1999). Early lexical development. In M. Barrett (Ed.), The development of language. London, UK: Psychology Press.

Dromi, E. & Ringwald-Frimerman, D., (1999). Language intervention with pre-linguistic and one-word stage hearing impaired children. In Weisel, A. (Ed.), Insights in deaf education: Current theory and practice. Tel Aviv, Israel: Tel Aviv University Press.

Dromi, E., Leonard, L. B., & A. Blass. (2002). Different Methodologies yield incongruous results: A study on the spontaneous use of verb forms in Hebrew. In Levy, Y. & Schaeffer, J. (Eds.).Towards a definition of Specific Language Impairment in children. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Earlbaum Associates.

Dromi, E. (2002). Babbling and early words. In Salkind, N.J. & Margolis, L. Child Development: Volume 1 of the Macmillan Psychology Reference Series. NY: Macmillan Reference USA. Pp. 45-47.

Dromi, E. (2002). Stages in the acquisition of Hebrew as a mother tongue. In P. Klein & Givon, D. (Eds.), Language, Learning and Literacy in the Preschool Years. Ramot, Tel Aviv, Israel. (Hebrew).

Dromi, E. (In Press). Old data new eyes: Theories on word meaning acquisition. In V. Gathercole (Ed.), Essays in honor of Melissa Bowerman. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Earlbaum Associates.