Autism and Residual Language Deficits Aylin Küntay Language and Communicative Disorders Meeting 9
Recovery is possible But only outcome measures are global cognitive measures and classroom placement Language outcomes? “optimal-outcome” children Diagnosis between 1 and 5 years of age and functioning well in school now
Tests TACL (Auditory comprehension of language) Expressive one-word picture vocabulary test Stanford-Binet memory for sentences Wug test of productive morphology
Tests Understanding of complex syntax Verb argument structure Medial wh-phrases How did the girl know what to take to school? Verb argument structure Noah’s Ark sentence enactment test Verb compliance vs. frame compliance
Tests Categorical induction task Prediction on the basis of same category Rabbits love chocolate; this is another rabbit that looks different; does it love chocolate? Certainty differences between mental state verbs Think vs. know vs. guess ToM Unexpected location Unexpected contents Narrative capability (the frog story) Many narrative variables, p. 814
Results What are the residual deficits?