Stimulation of Executive Functions as Part of the Language Intervention Process in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Figurative language processing in autism spectrum disorders: A review

Impairments in the broader domain of pragmatics are considered to be a defining feature of Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD). A challenging aspect of pragmatic competence is the ability to process nonliteral language. Interestingly, previous studies in figurative language comprehension in ASD have demonstrated conflicting results regarding participants' performance. The main scientific debate focuses on the underlying skills which facilitate processing of nonliteral speech in ASD. Namely, Theory of Mind (ToM), language abilities and Executive functions (EFs) are regarded as factors affecting autistic individuals' performance. This review addresses figurative language comprehension in ASD in light of the above three interpretive accounts. We reviewed data from recent studies in this field concluding that autistic children indeed encounter systematic difficulties in the processing of non-literal language. Moreover, only ToM and verbal skills were found to correlate the most with figurative language comprehension in ASD. Notably, we found that differences related to research methodology and tasks' properties may have led to discrepancies between studies' results. Finally, we argue that future studies should encompass in their experimental design figurative comprehension tasks with minimal linguistic demands and also measures of ToM, verbal ability and EFs in order to shed more light in the independent contribution of those skills to the processing of nonliteral language in ASD.

Cognitive rehabilitation in people with autism spectrum disorder: a systematic review of emerging virtual reality-based approaches

Introduction

Emerging virtual technologies and cognitive rehabilitation methods are two new treatment approaches that can be used to strengthen cognitive functions in Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). The main aim of this study was to examine the effect of using virtual reality-based approaches on cognitive disorders of children and adults with ASD.

Methods

This systematic review was conducted on scientific papers to determine the effects of virtual reality-based technologies on the cognitive functions of children and adults with ASD. We identified 688 studies related to this topic and filtered them down to 17 articles, and then extracted the effects of interventions on cognitive outcomes.

Results

A total of 17 studies met the inclusion criteria, in which 226 persons with ASD had taken place. The sample size in the selected studies ranged from 1 to 56 participants (Median: 8, Q1: 3.5, Q3: 15.5). Four of the studies were case–control studies, ten were pre-test/post-test studies, and three were Randomized Control Trials (RCTs). Results of 16 studies showed significant progress in various cognitive indexes, such as task learning, attention, executive functioning, and daily skills in people with ASD. In most studies, virtual technologies had beneficial effects on reducing cognitive problems, but existing limitations could reduce their effectiveness. These limitations included the cost of virtual reality devices, inappropriate size of software, the weight of devices, potential addiction, intolerance of wearing glasses or headsets by people with autism (especially in children), and the possibility of eye injury.

Conclusion

Applying appropriate virtual-based approaches could improve cognitive indexes in people with ASD. However, further studies are needed to investigate the real effects of these technologies in the long run.

Social Communication and pragmatic skills of children with Autism Spectrum Disorder and Developmental Language Disorder

PURPOSE

to assess the pragmatic and social communicative abilities of children with Typical Language Development (TLD), Autism Spectrum disorder (ASD) and Developmental Language Disorder (DLD).

METHODS

Participants were 40 parents and 29 teachers of 40 children ages between 3 and 6 years. Ten children had DLD, ten had ASD and 20 had typical development. All participants answered to the questionnaire of the "Assessment of Pragmatic Language and Social Communication - APLSC - parent and professional reports - beta research version. Data were submitted to statistical analysis.

RESULTS

The assessment tool was useful in identifying the difference in performance of children with different social communicative profiles.

CONCLUSION

Children with ASD presented social and pragmatic impairments that were more significant than those presented by children with DLD. However, both children with ASD and with DLD presented more social pragmatic difficulties than children with TLD.

Language delay aggregates in toddler siblings of children with autism spectrum disorder

BACKGROUND

Language delay is extremely common in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), yet it is unclear whether measurable variation in early language is associated with genetic liability for ASD. Assessment of language development in unaffected siblings of children with ASD can inform whether decreased early language ability aggregates with inherited risk for ASD and serves as an ASD endophenotype.

METHODS

We implemented two approaches: (1) a meta-analysis of studies comparing language delay, a categorical indicator of language function, and language scores, a continuous metric, in unaffected toddlers at high and low familial risk for ASD, and (2) a parallel analysis of 350 unaffected 24-month-olds in the Infant Brain Imaging Study (IBIS), a prospective study of infants at high and low familial risk for ASD. An advantage of the former was its detection of group differences from pooled data across unique samples; an advantage of the latter was its sensitivity in quantifying early manifestations of language delay while accounting for covariates within a single large sample.

RESULTS

Meta-analysis showed that high-risk siblings without ASD (HR-noASD) were three to four times more likely to exhibit language delay versus low-risk siblings without ASD (LR-noASD) and had lower mean receptive and expressive language scores. Analyses of IBIS data corroborated that language delay, specifically receptive language delay, was more frequent in the HR-noASD (n = 235) versus LR-noASD group (n = 115). IBIS language scores were continuously and unimodally distributed, with a pathological shift towards decreased language function in HR-noASD siblings. The elevated inherited risk for ASD was associated with lower receptive and expressive language scores when controlling for sociodemographic factors. For receptive but not expressive language, the effect of risk group remained significant even when controlling for nonverbal cognition.

CONCLUSIONS

Greater frequency of language delay and a lower distribution of language scores in high-risk, unaffected toddler-aged siblings support decreased early language ability as an endophenotype for ASD, with a more pronounced effect for receptive versus expressive language. Further characterization of language development is warranted to refine genetic investigations of ASD and to elucidate factors influencing the progression of core autistic traits and related symptoms.