Asperger’s Syndrome (AS) A look at social skills, pragmatic language, and Asperger’s Syndrome (AS) Alyssa Falbo Marshall University CD 315

What is Asperger’s Syndrome (AS)? Asperger’s Syndrome (AS) is a neurodevelopment disorder that shares many of the same symptoms as autism (Janzen, 2003). The term autism is from the Greek word autos, meaning self, which implies a narrowing of relationships to people and the outside world (Janzen, 2003). AS is on the high end of the autism spectrum.

Characteristics of AS: No outwardly physical characteristics (Ives, 1999) Typically above-level intelligence Sensory stimuli issues (e.g., may not like the texture of certain foods or fabrics, Smith Myles & Southwick, 1999) Poor social skills Poor use of language skills, particularly pragmatics (Smith Myles & Southwick, 1999)

Social Skill Deficits Difficultly building and maintaining relationships Difficulty understanding social cues Repeatedly interrupts others Poor language comprehension enables appropriate interaction Prefers to be alone (Smith Myles & Southwick, 1999) Image from the National Autism Association at http://www.nationalautismassociation.org/.

How are Social Skills affected? Children with AS have problems forming relationships due to self-focusing only on their interests, the determination for others to follow their thoughts as they want, and the tendency to act out when peers have interfered with their thoughts and actions. This behavior arises from the inability to understand the rules of social behavior. Therefore, social skills are learned without fully understanding the context and meaning. For example, a child with AS may not understand why it is acceptable to talk with peers in one class setting, yet unacceptable to talk with peers in another class setting (Smith Myles & Southwick, 1999).

Language Deficits Difficulty with pragmatic skills Difficulty understanding abstract concepts, e.g., metaphors, idioms, parables, allegories, and understanding the meaning of rhetorical questions (Smith Myles & Southwick, 1999). Image from the Carolina Autism at http://www.casls.org/.

What are pragmatics? Pragmatics is the sociolinguistic rules which govern how we use language. Pragmatics is made up of three components: Communicative function is the intent of speech acts.  What we say and how we say it is affected by what we’re trying to accomplish.  There are direct speech acts, which clearly state the intention of the speaker and indirect speech acts, which don’t always reflect the true intention of the speaker (Berko Gleason, 2005). For example, a direct speech act would be “Turn on the air conditioner.” but an indirect speech act would be “It sure is hot in here.” Linguistic selection is where what we say is affected by our perception of the context and the listener’s presuppositions (the assumptions that me make about what the listener already knows) (Berko Gleason, 2005). For example, it is inappropriate to talk during church. Discourse is the rules of conversation, e.g., initiation, topic maintenance, eye contact, termination, etc (Berko Gleason, 2005).

How are Pragmatics affected? Children with AS have trouble in this area of language because they do not take into account the feelings of others, maintain a topic, use turn taking skills, or maintain eye contact. They do not understand that others do not care about their particular obsessions, for example, airplanes or race cars. Due to the lack of social skills and these unusual behaviors children with AS are usually viewed as “weird,” “geeky,” or “crazy” (Little, 2003).

Abstract Language Concepts Children with AS often have trouble understanding abstract language concepts, which is also referred to as non-literal language. A child with AS often takes everything you say literally, e.g., if you say “I’ll be back in one minuet,” they literally expect you to be back in 60 seconds (Martin & McDonald, 2004).  Children with AS do not understand the concept of figurative language. They often question why a person would say “it’s raining cats and dogs” when in fact it isn’t.

Why Speech-Language Therapy? Since one of the five components of language is pragmatics, and it is an affected area of AS one of the key professionals in a child’s life should be a speech-language pathologist (SLP). A SLP can work with the child on understanding the components of discourse, such as initiation, eye contact, turn taking, topic maintenance, and termination. Learning the skills of conversation also aids the child with social skills (Janzen, 2003).

Why Speech-Language Therapy? By providing techniques in therapy to a child with AS the SLP is giving the child the ability to form relationships through conversation. We initiate a conversation usually with the idea of accomplishing something, such as finding out where the library is. Everyone should have the skills to socially engage with another person and form relationships. With time, patience, and practice SLPs can help children with AS meet the goals necessary to communicate efficiently (Janzen, 2003). Image from the National Autism Association at http://www.nationalautismassociation.org/.

References: http://arfalbo.wordpress.com/references/