"If you catch my drift...": ability to infer implied meaning is distinct from vocabulary and grammar skills

Abstract

Background: Some individuals with autism find it challenging to use and understand language in conversation, despite having good abilities in core aspects of language such as grammar and vocabulary. This suggests that pragmatic skills (such as understanding implied meanings in conversation) are separable from core language skills. However, it has been surprisingly difficult to demonstrate this dissociation in the general population. We propose that this may be because prior studies have used tasks in which different aspects of language are confounded. Methods: The present study used novel language tasks and factor analysis to test whether pragmatic understanding of implied meaning, as part of a broader domain involving social understanding, is separable from core language skills. 120 adult participants were recruited online to complete a 7-task battery, including a test assessing comprehension of conversational implicature. Results: In confirmatory analysis of a preregistered model, we compared whether the data showed better fit to a two-factor structure (including a “social understanding” and “core language” factor) or a simpler one-factor structure (comprising a general factor). The two-factor model showed significantly better fit. Conclusions: This study supports the view that interpreting context-dependent conversational meaning is partially distinct from core language skills. This has implications for understanding the pragmatic language impairments reported in autism.

“Second guessing yourself all the time about what they really mean…”: Cognitive differences between autistic and non‐autistic adults in understanding implied meaning

“…This suggests that the cognitive differences observed here between autistic and non‐autistic people are more of a categoric difference (i.e., a different way of thinking) rather than a thinking style that varies continuously with autistic‐like traits. In our previous general population sample (Wilson & Bishop, 2019), average AQ scores were elevated above population norms and the range of scores was broad, so the lack of a relationship between autistic traits and implicature scores cannot easily be attributed to issues with the data distribution. The AQ may not tap continuous variation well perhaps, as there is some uncertainty about its appropriateness for this purpose (James, Dubey, Smith, Ropar, & Tunney, 2016), although there is continuous genetic influence on the measure across the general population and at the extreme (Robinson et al, 2013).…”

“…Interestingly, in our previous paper (Wilson & Bishop, 2019), there was no relationship between scores on the Autism‐Spectrum Quotient (AQ; Baron‐Cohen, Wheelwright, Skinner, Martin, & Clubley, 2001) and the ICT in a general population sample of adults. The AQ is taken to measure autism‐related traits, including subtle social difficulties and a preference for routine and focused interests, as they vary continuously throughout the general population.…”

“…We tested total implicature score, number of “do not know” responses, and residualized versions of these indices. For residualized scores, we calculated the difference between a participant's actual score and the score expected from their performance on the control items; expected scores were computed based on linear regression in an unrelated sample of 120 non‐autistic adults (the pilot study reported in Wilson & Bishop, 2019). We also tested whether it was appropriate to exclude participants based on their score on the control items of the ICT (out of 10).…”

“…This last point highlights a key debate in the literature surrounding difficulties with inferences and non‐literal language in autism: some studies have attributed these pragmatic difficulties to co‐occurring language impairments (Lucas & Norbury, 2014; Norbury & Nation, 2011), whereas others support the idea that autistic people experience challenges with inferences that go over and beyond any difficulties with core language skills (Norbury & Bishop, 2002; Jolliffe & Baron‐Cohen, 1999, 2000). The present research aimed to clarify some of these uncertainties by investigating differences in the processing of implied meaning between autistic and non‐autistic people, with a focus on a novel task, the Implicature Comprehension Test (ICT; Wilson & Bishop, 2019).…”

Pragmatic Language Processing in the Adolescent Brain

“…The listener had to infer the speaker's intention by taking into account the content of the preceding question, as well as the speaker's voice, prosody, and/or the relationship between interlocutors. The process of interpreting meaning via context-dependent inference offers a measure of pragmatic abilities that is distinct from core language abilities [67].…”