Attentional Learning Helps Language Acquisition Take Shape for Atypically Developing Children, Not Just Children with Autism Spectrum Disorders

Field, Charlotte; Allen, Melissa L.; Lewis, C. S.

doi:10.1007/s10803-015-2401-1

Cited by 15 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 65 publications

(121 reference statements)

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“…Therefore, participants with ASC and TD participants were matched on receptive language ability and were not matched on chronological age. This study is consistent with previous research matching on receptive language ability that have comparable age ranges and mean ages for both groups (Allen et al, 2015;Field et al, 2016;Hartley & Allen, 2014a, 2015bMaljaars et al, 2012;Tager-Flusberg, 1985;Tek et al, 2008). 2.…”

Section: Orcid Idsupporting

confidence: 92%

Narrative comprehension and engagement with e-books vs. paper-books in autism spectrum condition

Wainwright

Allen

Cain

2020

Autism & Developmental Language Impairments

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Background and aims: Children with autism spectrum condition often have specific difficulties with narrative comprehension, a skill which has a strong association with both concurrent and longitudinal reading comprehension. A better understanding of narrative comprehension skills in autism spectrum condition has the potential to provide insight into potential later reading comprehension difficulties and inform early targeted intervention. In the current study, the main objective was to investigate how differences in the medium of story presentation (paper-book vs. e-book) and differences in story narration (adult narration vs. in-app narration) would influence narrative comprehension in general, and between groups (autism spectrum condition and a receptive language-matched control group). We were also interested in how task engagement (visual attention and communication) differed between group and conditions and whether task engagement was related to narrative comprehension. Method: Forty-two children with autism spectrum condition and 42 typically developing children were read a story either via a paper-book or an e-book with interactive and multimedia features. The e-book was either narrated by the experimenter (adult narrated iPad condition) or narrated by an in-app voiceover (e-book narrated iPad condition). Children's behaviour during storybook reading was video recorded and coded for engagement (visual attention and communication). They then completed two measures of narrative comprehension: multiple-choice questions (measuring recall of literal information) and a picture ordering task (measuring global story structure). Results: Contrary to predictions, we did not find any significant group or condition differences on either measure of narrative comprehension, and both groups demonstrated a similar level of narrative comprehension across the three conditions. We found differences in engagement between conditions for both groups, with greater visual attention in the e-book conditions compared to the paper-book condition. However, visual attention only significantly correlated with narrative comprehension for the typically developing group. Conclusion: Overall, this study suggests that children with autism spectrum condition are just as able as languagematched peers to comprehend a narrative from storybooks. Presenting a story on an iPad e-book compared to a paperbook does not influence narrative comprehension, nor does adult narration of the story compared to in-app narration. However, on-task engagement is linked to narrative comprehension in typically developing children. Implications: Taken together, our findings suggest that e-books may be more successful than paper-based mediums at encouraging visual attention towards the story, but no better at supporting narrative comprehension and eliciting communication.

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Section: Orcid Idsupporting

confidence: 92%

Narrative comprehension and engagement with e-books vs. paper-books in autism spectrum condition

Wainwright

Allen

Cain

2020

Autism & Developmental Language Impairments

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“…In particular, when children with ASD who have low expressive language levels [Hartley & Allen, 2014 and/or IQs below 70 [Preissler, 2008] are targeted, studies suggest impairments in extension to appropriate category members. One specific type of extension that may be impaired in ASD is extension via the shape bias [Field, Allen, & Lewis, 2015;Potrzeba, Fein, & Naigles, 2015;Tek, Jaffery, Fein, & Naigles, 2008], which informs children's generalizations of nouns from one category exemplar to others: TD children prefer to generalize nouns by shape, rather than by other attributes such as color or texture, by about 2 years of age [Landau, Smith, & Jones, 1988]. Tek et al [2008] and Potrzeba et al [2015] found that children with ASD as a group did not use the shape bias to categorize novel nouns even at 4 years, although Field et al [2015] found that children with a relatively high verbal mental age did use the shape bias (and children with a lower verbal mental age did not), and Potrzeba et al [2015] reported intriguing associations between vocabulary size and fine motor skill in a subset of children with ASD who did show evidence of the shape bias.…”

Section: Generalizing Words To the Appropriate Categorymentioning

confidence: 99%

The integrity of lexical acquisition mechanisms in autism spectrum disorders: A research review

Arunachalam

Luyster

2015

Autism Research

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Scientific Abstract Research on autism spectrum disorders (ASD) has rapidly expanded in recent years, yielding important developments in both theory and practice. While we have gained important insights into how children with ASD differ from typically developing (TD) children in terms of phenotypic features, less has been learned about if and how development in ASD differs from typical development in terms of underlying mechanisms of change. This paper aims to provide a review of processes subserving lexical development in ASD, with the goal of identifying contributing factors to the heterogeneity of language outcomes in ASD. The focus is on available evidence of the integrity or disruption of these mechanisms in ASD, as well as their significance for vocabulary development; topics include early speech perception and preference, speech segmentation, word learning and category formation. Significant gaps in the literature are identified and future directions are suggested.

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“…This “ shape bias ” is driven by TD children's sensitivity to word-shape co-occurrences during infancy (Samuelson and Smith, 2005 ) and their abstraction of prototypes (mental representations of a category's “central tendency”; Younger, 1990 ). By contrast, children with ASD do not show an attentional bias for shape in word learning contexts (Tek et al, 2008 ; Hartley and Allen, 2014a ), likely due to deficits in foundational nonverbal processes (Frith and Happé, 1994 ; Klinger and Dawson, 2001 ) or a delay in learning the strategy (Field et al, 2016 ). However, presenting multiple differently-colored examples of a target referent (rather than a single exemplar) when teaching a new name may serve to highlight similarity of shape, thus fostering shape-based generalizations despite unusual attentional biases.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

iPads and the Use of “Apps” by Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Do They Promote Learning?

2016

Self Cite

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The advent of electronic tablets, such as Apple's iPad, has opened up the field of learning via technology, and the use of electronic applications (“apps”) on these devices continues to dramatically rise. Children with communication and social impairment, specifically those with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), often use educational and recreational apps within the context of their home and school settings. Here we examine in which contexts learning via this medium may be beneficial, and outline recommendations for the use of electronic tablets and the design features for apps to promote learning in this population that is characterized by a unique profile of needs and heterogeneous ability levels.

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Attentional Learning Helps Language Acquisition Take Shape for Atypically Developing Children, Not Just Children with Autism Spectrum Disorders

Cited by 15 publications

References 65 publications

Narrative comprehension and engagement with e-books vs. paper-books in autism spectrum condition

Narrative comprehension and engagement with e-books vs. paper-books in autism spectrum condition

The integrity of lexical acquisition mechanisms in autism spectrum disorders: A research review

iPads and the Use of “Apps” by Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Do They Promote Learning?

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