Young Children with ASD Use Lexical and Referential Information During On-line Sentence Processing

Area of Science:

• Developmental Psychology
• Linguistics
• Neurodevelopmental Disorders

Background:

• Verb biases significantly influence sentence interpretation in typically developing (TD) individuals.
• Limited research exists on how verb biases affect sentence processing in children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD).
• Understanding sentence ambiguity resolution is crucial for cognitive development and communication.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate if high-functioning children with ASD are sensitive to verb biases like their TD peers.
• To determine if young children with ASD and TD children can override strong verb biases when processing ambiguous sentences.
• To compare sentence processing speed and ambiguity resolution strategies between children with ASD and TD children.

Main Methods:

• Participants: 5-9 year old high-functioning children with ASD and age-matched TD children.
• Task 1: Assessed sensitivity to verb biases using biasing and neutral verbs.
• Task 2: Evaluated the ability to override verb-instrument biases with implausible instruments in prepositional phrases.

Main Results:

• Both ASD and TD groups showed sensitivity to verb biases, looking faster at objects with biasing verbs.
• Both groups successfully overrode verb-instrument biases in implausible conditions, favoring alternative interpretations.
• Children with ASD were generally slower in language processing tasks compared to TD children.

Conclusions:

• Children aged 5 and above, including those with high-functioning ASD, can utilize context to override verb biases.
• Core sentence processing mechanisms, including integrating verb semantics and plausibility, appear largely intact in young children with high-functioning ASD.
• Slower language processing speed in children with ASD may negatively impact their overall understanding and academic achievement.