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Rationale. In light of recent recommendations for characterizing expressive language in young children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD; Tager-Flusberg et al., 2009), the current study compared the language produced by children with ASD across language sampling contexts: the Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule (ADOS), examiner-child play, and parent-child play.
Method. Participants were 36 children with ASD (M=45 months of age; SD=4). Children completed the ADOS, as well as separate play sessions with an examiner and parent. Fifteen minute language samples from each were transcribed using SALT.
Results. The number of utterances produced, intelligibility, number of different words, and MLU were compared across the three language sampling contexts. Differences among contexts emerged for each variable, such that the ADOS resulted in fewer utterances, lower intelligibility, fewer different words, and lower MLU than play.
Conclusions. The current findings highlight the need for researchers and clinicians to attend closely to the language sampling context chosen to assess young children with ASD.
Funding Sources: NIH P30HD03352, T32DC05359, and R01DC007223. |
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