Skip to main content

Strategies for Conducting Research on Language in Autism

Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders volume 34, pages 75–80 (2004)Cite this article

Abstract

Several different methodological approaches that have been used in studying language in children with autism are outlined. In classic studies, children with autism are compared to comparison groups typically matched on age, IQ, or mental age in order to identify which aspects of language are uniquely impaired in autism. Several methodological problems are noted with this approach including (a) heterogeneity of the autism population, (b) mental retardation, (c) developmental change with age, and (d) sample size and ascertainment. An alternative strategy is suggested which focuses on identifying the complex expression of the language phenotype in autism across the full range of the syndrome. This approach explores within-group individual differences in language functioning, and recently identified distinct language phenotypic sub-groups within the autism population that are relevant to understanding the underlying genetic and neurobiological etiology of autism.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution.

Access options

Buy single article

Instant access to the full article PDF.

43,34 €

Price includes VAT (Finland)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Reference

  • Alarcon M., Cantor R., Liu J., Gilliam, T. C., Geschwind D., & AGRE Consortium (2002). Evidence for a language quantitative trait locus on chromosome 7q in multiplex autism families. American Journal of Human Genetics, 70, 60-71.

    Google Scholar 

  • American Psychiatric Association (1994). Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV), 4th Edition. Washington, DC: APA.

    Google Scholar 

  • Baltaxe, C. A. M. (1977). Pragmatic deficits in the language of autistic adolescents. Journal of Pediatric Psychology, 2, 176-180.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bartak L., Rutter M., & Cox, A. (1975). A comparative study of infantile autism and specific developmental receptive language disorder: I. The children. British Journal of Psychiatry, 126, 127-145.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bartak L., Rutter M., & Cox, A. (1977). A comparative study of infantile autism and specific developmental receptive language disorders: II. Discriminant function analysis. Journal of Autism and Childhood Schizophrenia, 7, 383-396.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bartlett C., Flax J., Logue M., Vieland V., Bassett A., Tallal P., & Brzustowicz, L. (2002). A major susceptibility locus for specific language impairment is located on 13q21. American Journal of Human Genetics, 71, 45-55.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bartoclucci G., Pierce S., Streiner D., & Eppel, P. (1976). Phonological investigation of verbal autistic and mentally retarded subjects. Journal of Autism and Childhood Schizophrenia, 6, 303-315.

    Google Scholar 

  • Capps L., Kehres J., & Sigman, M. (1998). Conversational abilities among children with autism and children with developmental delays. Autism, 2, 325-344.

    Google Scholar 

  • CLSA (2001). Incorporating language phenotypes strengthens evidence of linkage to autism. American Journal of Medical Genetics, 105, 539-547.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cunningham, M. (1966). A five-year study of the language of an autistic child. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 7, 143-154.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dawson G., Webb S., Schellenberg G., Dager S., Friedman S., Aylward E., & Richards, T. (2002). Defining the broader phenotype of autism: Genetic, brain, and behavioral perspectives. Development and Psychopathology, 14, 581-611.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gathercole, S. E., & Baddeley, A. D. (1990). Phonological memory deficits in language disordered children: Is there a causal connection? Journal of Memory and Language, 29, 336-360.

    Google Scholar 

  • Goldfarb W., Braunstein P., & Lorge, I. A. (1956). A study of speech patterns in a group of schizophrenic children. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 26, 544-555.

    Google Scholar 

  • Happé, F. (2003). Cognition in autism: One deficit or many? Novartis Foundation Symposium, 251, 198-207.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hermelin B., & O'Connor, N. (1970). Psychological experiments with autistic children. Oxford: Pergamon Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kanner, L. (1943). Autistic disturbances of affective contact. Nervous Child, 2, 217-250.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kanner, L. (1946). Irrelevant and metaphorical language. American Journal of Psychiatry, 103, 242-246.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kjelgaard M., & Tager-Flusberg, H. (2001). An investigation of language impairment in autism: Implications for genetic subgroups. Language and Cognitive Processes, 16, 287-308.

    Google Scholar 

  • Krug D., Arick J., & Almond, P. (1980). Behavior checklist for identifying severely handicapped individuals with high levels of autistic behavior. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 21, 221-229.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lord C., & Paul, R. (1997). Language and communication in autism. In D. J. Cohen & F. R. Volkmar (Eds.), Handbook of autism and pervasive developmental disorders, 2nd edition (pp. 195-225). New York: John Wiley & Sons.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lord C., Rutter M., & LeCouteur, A. (1994). Autism diagnostic interview-revised: A revised version of a diagnostic interview for caregivers of individuals with possible pervasive developmental disorders. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 24, 659-685.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lord C., Risi S., Lambrecht L., Cook, E. H., Lenventhal, B. L., DiLavore, P. S., Pickles A., & Rutter, M. (2000). The Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule-Generic: A standard measure of social and communication deficits associated with the spectrum of autism. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 30, 205-223.

    Google Scholar 

  • Loveland K., Landry S., Hughes S., Hall S., & McEvoy, R. (1988). Speech acts and the pragmatic deficits of autism. Journal of Speech and Hearing Research, 31, 593-604.

    Google Scholar 

  • Norbury C., & Bishop, D. V. M. (2002). Inferential processing and story recall in children with communication problems: A comparison of specific language impairment, pragmatic language impairment and high-functioning autism. International Journal of Language and Communication Disorders, 37, 227-251.

    Google Scholar 

  • O'Brien E., Zhang X., Nishimura C., Tomblin, J. B., & Murray, J. (2003). Association of specific language impairment (SLI) to the region of 7q31. American Journal of Human Genetics, 72, 1536-1543.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pierce S., & Bartoclucci, G. (1977). A syntactic investigation of verbal autistic, mentally retarded and normal children. Journal of Autism and Childhood Schizophrenia, 7, 121-134.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pronovost W., Wakstein, M. P., & Wakstein, D. J. (1966). A longitudinal study of the speech behavior and language comprehension of fourteen children diagnosed atypical or autistic. Exceptional Children, 33, 19-26.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rice, M. L., & Wexler, K. (1996). Toward tense as a clinical marker of specific language impairment in English-speaking children. Journal of Speech and Hearing Research, 39, 1239-1257.

    Google Scholar 

  • Schopler E., Reichler R., De Vellis, R. F., & Daly, K. (1980). The Childhood Autism Rating Scale (CARS) for diagnostic screening and classification of autism. New York: Irvington.

    Google Scholar 

  • Shapiro T., & Fish, B. (1969). A method to study language deviation as an aspect of ego organization in young schizophrenic children. Journal of the American Academy of Child Psychiatry, 8, 36-56.

    Google Scholar 

  • Surian L., Baron-Cohen S., & Van der Lely, H. (1996). Are children with autism deaf to Gricean maxims? Cognitive Neuropsychiatry, 1, 55-72.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tager-Flusberg, H. (1981a). Sentence comprehension in autistic children. Applied Psycholinguistics, 2, 5-24.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tager-Flusberg, H. (1981b). On the nature of linguistic functioning in early infantile autism. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 11, 45-56.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tager-Flusberg, H. (1985). The conceptual basis for referential word meaning in children with autism. Child Development, 56, 1167-1178.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tager-Flusberg, H. (1994). Dissociations in form and function in the acquisition of language by autistic children. In H. Tager-Flusberg (Ed.), Constraints on language acquisition: Studies of atypical children (pp. 175-194). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tager-Flusberg, H. (2000). Understanding the language and communicative impairments in autism. In L. M. Glidden (Ed.), Autism (pp. 185-205). San Diego: Academic Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tager-Flusberg, H. (2003). Language impairments in children with complex neurodevelopmental disorders: The case of autism. In Y. Levy & J. Schaeffer (Eds.), Language competence across populations: Toward a definition of specific language impairment (pp. 297-321). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tager-Flusberg, H. (in press). Do autism and specific language impairment represent overlapping language disorders? In M. L. Rice & S. Warren (Eds.), Developmental language disorders: From phenotypes to etiologies. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

  • Tager-Flusberg H., & Anderson, M. (1991). The development of contingent discourse ability in autistic children. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 32, 1123-1134.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tager-Flusberg H., & Cooper, J. (1999). Present and future possibilities for defining a phenotype for specific language impairment. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 42, 1275-1278.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tager-Flusberg H., & Joseph, R. M. (2003). Identifying neurocognitive phenotypes in autism. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, Series B, 358, 303-314.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tomblin, J. B., & Zhang, X. (1999). Language patterns and etiology in children with specific language impairment. In H. Tager-Flusberg (Ed.), Neurodevelopmental Disorders (pp. 361-382). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press/Bradford Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • World Health Organization (1993). The international classification of diseases,10th edition.Geneva:World Health Organization.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Affiliations

  1. Department of Anatomy and Neurobiology, Boston University School of Medicine, 715 Albany Street L-814, Boston, MA, 02118

    Helen Tager-Flusberg

Authors
  1. Helen Tager-Flusberg
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Helen Tager-Flusberg.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Tager-Flusberg, H. Strategies for Conducting Research on Language in Autism. J Autism Dev Disord 34, 75–80 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1023/B:JADD.0000018077.64617.5a

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/B:JADD.0000018077.64617.5a

  • Autism
  • genetics
  • language
  • phenotype
  • subtypes