Registered report: investigating a preference for certainty in conversation among autistic adults compared to dyslexic adults and the general population

Abstract

Social communication difficulties are a diagnostic feature in autism. These difficulties are sometimes attributed, at least in part, to impaired ability in making inferences about what other people mean. In this registered report, we test a competing hypothesis that the communication profile of adults on the autism spectrum can be more strongly characterised by reduced confidence in making inferences in the face of uncertain information. We will test this hypothesis by comparing the performance of 100 autistic and 100 non-autistic adults on a test of implied meaning, using a test of grammaticality judgements as a control task. We hypothesise that autistic adults will report substantially lower confidence, allowing for differences in accuracy, than non-autistic adults on the test of implied meaning compared to the grammaticality test. In addition, we hypothesise that reduced confidence in drawing inferences will relate to the cognitive trait Intolerance of Uncertainty and self-reported social communication challenges. Finally, we will conduct exploratory analysis to assess the specificity of the communication profile of the autistic adults by comparing their performance to that of dyslexic adults, who might also be expected to experience challenges with language and communication.

Dyslexia and Pragmatic Skills

“…Similar distinctions need to be confirmed in further studies enrolling larger numbers of participants. This is indeed the direction that the literature is taking now, as illustrated for instance in a recent registered report seeking to compare conversational aspects in adults with autism and dyslexia (Wilson & Bishop, 2020).…”

Stage 2 registered report: investigating a preference for certainty in conversation among autistic adults

“…Methods and our analysis plan for this project were published as a registered report ( Wilson & Bishop, 2020b ): https://peerj.com/articles/10398/ . Ethical approval for this project was granted on 30/03/2020 by the Medical Science Interdivisional Research Ethics Committee at Oxford University (Ref: R68518/RE001).…”

Accounting for the preference for literal meanings in autism spectrum conditions

“…Rules put some order in an otherwise chaotic world. Similarly, A. C. Wilson and Bishop (2020, 2021) suggest that pragmatic difficulties in autism may relate to intolerance of uncertainty (South & Rodgers, 2017). One way to react to such uncertainty is to abide by rules, which provide some safe ground.…”

“…This study also found no correlation between reaction times and ToM skills. Recent work by A. C. Wilson and Bishop (2019, 2020, 2021) shows that autistic individuals have problems understanding implicit meanings, such as particularised implicatures, that are not predicted by linguistic skills. Interestingly, they suggest that failures to adequately derive implicatures and sticking to only what is explicitly said may relate to experiencing intolerance of uncertainty (South & Rodgers, 2017), which may give rise to strict adherence to rules.…”