Gestures in Storytelling by Preschool Chinese-Speaking Children With and Without Autism

Ying, Huang; Wong, Miranda Kit-Yi; Lam, Wwt; Cheng, C. C.; So, Wing-Chee

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2020.573212

Cited by 7 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 41 publications

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“…In early to middle childhood, some studies found autistic individuals produced fewer emblematic gestures than neurotypical peers (Delehanty & Wetherby, 2021; Huang et al, 2020; Manwaring et al, 2019; Murillo et al, 2021), while one reported no group differences (LeBarton & Iverson, 2016). For individuals in middle childhood to adolescence, one study found autistic individuals produced fewer emblematic gestures than neurotypical peers (Medeiros & Winsler, 2014), whereas others reported no group differences (Baumann et al, 2019; Rogers, 2003; So & Wong, 2016; Wong & So, 2018).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…For representational gestures, some studies found autistic individuals produced fewer iconic gestures than neurotypical peers in early to middle childhood (Delehanty & Wetherby, 2021; Mishra et al, 2021), while others reported no group differences (Bernard et al, 2006; Huang et al, 2020; Murillo et al, 2021; Özçalışkan et al, 2016). For individuals in middle childhood to adulthood, however, studies either reported no differences in iconic and metaphoric gesture frequencies between groups (Baumann et al, 2019; de Marchena & Eigsti, 2010; de Marchena et al, 2019; Medeiros & Winsler, 2014; Morett et al, 2016; Rogers, 2003; So, Lui, et al, 2015) or that autistic individuals produced more iconic gestures than neurotypical peers (So & Wong, 2016; Wong & So, 2018).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Comparing gesture frequency between autistic and neurotypical individuals: A systematic review and meta-analysis.

McKern,

Dargue,

Sweller

2023

Psychological Bulletin

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While diagnostic assessments for autism routinely screen for reduced frequency of gestures, evidence supporting reduced gesture production in autism is inconsistent. This systematic review and meta-analysis aimed to clarify differences in frequency of gestures between autistic and neurotypical individuals. Included studies compared frequency of gestures between autistic and neurotypical individuals. Database searches (APA PsycInfo, ERIC, MEDLINE, ProQuest Dissertations and Theses Global) and a call for unpublished data on the International Society for Gesture Studies listserv identified research from January 1994 to March 2023. Study quality was assessed using the Joanna Briggs Institute Critical Appraisal Checklist for Quasi-Experimental Designs. Quantitative synthesis involved a narrative review of all findings and meta-analysis of articles allowing effect size calculations, stratified by the type of gesture. Thirty-one articles comparing frequency of gestures between 701 autistic and 860 neurotypical individuals were included in the narrative review, 25 of which were also included in the meta-analysis. Compared to neurotypical individuals, metaanalyses found that autistic individuals produced significantly less total, deictic, and emblematic gestures. While the number of iconic gestures appeared comparable between groups, studies investigating iconic gestures exhibited an almost equal trend of both positive and negative effect sizes, which were mostly nonsignificant. The way gesture production was measured, age, observer familiarity, and task structure (but not overall study quality) moderated the effect size, albeit inconsistently across the types of gestures. Findings have implications relating to profiling gesture use in diagnostic assessments for autism and highlight gaps in our understanding of differences in gesture production in autism. Public Significance StatementThis systematic review and meta-analysis found that while autistic individuals tended to produce certain types of gestures less frequently than neurotypical individuals across studies, they produced other types of gestures at comparable or higher frequencies than neurotypical individuals. The way gesture production was measured, age, observer familiarity, and task structure impacted the pattern of results. Findings have implications for clinicians assessing gesture use in assessments for autism and highlight where further research is needed to better understand differences in gesture production in autism.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Comparing gesture frequency between autistic and neurotypical individuals: A systematic review and meta-analysis.

McKern,

Dargue,

Sweller

2023

Psychological Bulletin

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“…These cases of topic development followed the correct naming or description of the functions of the objects or professions of individuals, further describing them vividly, often with an animated tone, iconic gestures (cf. Huang et al, 2020), or facial expressions. Such expansions were always related to the children's direct experience of using the target entities or interacting with the target professionals or individuals, as confirmed by the children's parents.…”

Section: Delayed Functional Echolalia: Question Orientedmentioning

confidence: 99%

Functional echolalia in autism speech: Verbal formulae and repeated prior utterances as communicative and cognitive strategies

Xie

Pascual²,

Oakley³

2023

Front. Psychol.

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Echolalia, the echoing of prior speech, is a typical characteristic of autism. Long considered meaningless repetition to be avoided, echolalia may in fact be used functionally in autism. This paper explores the functions of echolalia by children with autism. Based on two prior studies, we designed an elicitation task involving images of 12 professions (teacher) and 12 objects (birthday cake) commonly associated with given conventionalized expressions in Mandarin (e.g., “sheng ri kuai le!” ‘Happy birthday!’). Eight Chinese children with autism (mean age: 55.50 ± 8.64) were asked to name and describe these images. All our participants produced a relatively high proportion of echolalia, mostly for naming, description, and topic development, a small percentage being used as conversation maintenance strategy or as cognitive strategy. This indicates that echolalia is often used communicatively in autism speech.

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“… Choi et al, 2020 ), verbally fluent children (e.g. Baumann et al, 2019 ; Huang et al, 2020 ; So et al, 2015 ), and verbally fluent adolescents with ASD (e.g. Morett et al, 2016 ).…”

Section: Autism Spectrum Disordermentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Although one study found variable results (Wong & So, 2018), verbally fluent children (e.g. Baumann et al, 2019;Huang et al, 2020;So et al, 2015) and verbally fluent adolescents with ASD (e.g. Morett et al, 2016) produced fewer supplementary gesturespeech combinations when compared to neurotypically developing peers.…”

Section: Gesture-speech Combinationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

How do minimally verbal children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorder use communicative gestures to complement their spoken language abilities?

Valle

Chenausky

Tager–Flusberg

2021

Autism & Developmental Language Impairments

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Background and aims Prior work has examined how children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorder who are minimally verbal use their spoken language abilities during interactions with others. However, social communication includes other aspects beyond speech. To our knowledge, no studies have examined how minimally verbal children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorder are using their gestural communication during social interactions. Such work can provide important insights into how gestures may complement their spoken language abilities. Methods Fifty minimally verbal children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorder participated ( Mage = 12.41 years; 38 males). Gestural communication was coded from the Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule. Children ( n = 25) and adolescents ( n = 25) were compared on their production of gestures, gesture–speech combinations, and communicative functions. Communicative functions were also assessed by the type of communication modality: gesture, speech, and gesture–speech to examine the range of communicative functions across different modalities of communication. To explore the role gestures may play the relation between speech utterances and gestural production was investigated. Results Analyses revealed that (1) minimally verbal children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorder did not differ in their total number of gestures. The most frequently produced gesture across children and adolescents was a reach gesture, followed by a point gesture (deictic gesture), and then conventional gestures. However, adolescents produced more gesture–speech combinations (reinforcing gesture-speech combinations) and displayed a wider range of communicative functions. (2) Overlap was found in the types of communicative functions expressed across different communication modalities. However, requests were conveyed via gesture more frequently compared to speech or gesture–speech. In contrast, dis/agree/acknowledging and responding to a question posed by the conversational partner was expressed more frequently via speech compared to gesture or gesture–speech. (3) The total number of gestures was negatively associated with total speech utterances after controlling for chronological age, receptive communication ability, and nonverbal IQ. Conclusions Adolescents may be employing different communication strategies to maintain the conversational exchange and to further clarify the message they want to convey to the conversational partner. Although overlap occurred in communicative functions across gesture, speech, and gesture–speech, nuanced differences emerged in how often they were expressed across different modalities of communication. Given their speech production abilities, gestures may play a compensatory role for some individuals with autism spectrum disorder who are minimally verbal. Implications Findings underscore the importance of assessing multiple modalities of communication to provide a fuller picture of their social communication abilities. Our results identified specific communicative strengths and areas for growth that can be targeted and expanded upon within gesture and speech to optimize social communication development.

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Gestures in Storytelling by Preschool Chinese-Speaking Children With and Without Autism

Cited by 7 publications

References 41 publications

Comparing gesture frequency between autistic and neurotypical individuals: A systematic review and meta-analysis.

Comparing gesture frequency between autistic and neurotypical individuals: A systematic review and meta-analysis.

Functional echolalia in autism speech: Verbal formulae and repeated prior utterances as communicative and cognitive strategies

How do minimally verbal children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorder use communicative gestures to complement their spoken language abilities?

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