Assessing Pragmatic Language in Autism Spectrum Disorder: The Yale in vivo Pragmatic Protocol

Purpose: This study compared pragmatic language in youths (9–17 years) with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and those with typical development (TD) on the Yale in vivo Pragmatic Protocol (YiPP), a semistructured, dynamic conversational assessment. Method: Participants (n = 118) were divided into groups based on age and diagnosis. Each completed the YiPP, which included 4 pragmatic domains (discourse management, communicative functions, conversational repair, presupposition). The participant’s response to each probe was scored correct or incorrect; incorrect scores elicited cues from the examiner, and level of cue required for a correction was also scored. Results: The YiPP showed high reliability and internal consistency, with moderate concurrent validity, sensitivity, and specificity. The group with ASD performed worse overall on YiPP probes compared to their TD counterparts on both error (d = 0.96) and cue (d = 0.91) scores. Item analyses revealed greater gaps between older students with ASD and their TD peers than between the 2 younger groups. Conclusions: These data suggest that a probe measure designed to assess pragmatic abilities in children with ASD within a conversational context has some validity for contributing to diagnostic classification and can identify specific areas of pragmatic vulnerabilities as part of a clinical assessment

Brief Report: A Mobile Application to Treat Prosodic Deficits in Autism Spectrum Disorder and Other Communication Impairments: A Pilot Study

This study examined the acceptability of a mobile application, SpeechPrompts, designed to treat prosodic disorders in children with ASD and other communication impairments. Ten speech-language pathologists (SLPs) in public schools and 40 of their students, 5-19 years with prosody deficits participated. Students received treatment with the software over eight weeks. Pre- and post-treatment speech samples and student engagement data were collected. Feedback on the utility of the software was also obtained. SLPs implemented the software with their students in an authentic education setting. Student engagement ratings indicated students\u27 attention to the software was maintained during treatment. Although more testing is warranted, post-treatment prosody ratings suggest that SpeechPrompts has potential to be a useful tool in the treatment of prosodic disorders

Enhancing the Application and Evaluation of a Discrete Trial Intervention Package for Eliciting First Words in Preverbal Preschoolers with ASD

This study evaluates the effectiveness of an intervention package including a discrete trial program (Rapid Motor Imitation Antecedent Training (Tsiouri and Greer, J Behav Educat 12:185–206, 2003) combined with parent education for eliciting first words in children with ASD who had little or no spoken language. Evaluation of the approach includes specific intervention targets and functional spoken language outcomes (Tager-Flusberg et al., J Speech Lang Hear Res 52:643–652, 2009). Results suggest that RMIA, with parent training, catalyzes development of verbal imitation and production for some children. Three of five participants acquired word production within the DTT framework and achieved milestones of early functional spoken language use (Tager-Flusberg et al., J Speech Lang Hear Res 52:643–652, 2009). The implications of these findings for understanding the role of discrete trial approaches to language intervention are discussed

The Use of Mobile Technology in the Treatment of Prosodic Deficits in Autism Spectrum Disorders

Objectives: The purpose of this study is to assess the feasibility and preliminary utility of an application, SpeechPrompts, for iOS devices in the treatment of prosodic disorders in school-age children with ASD

Nonword Repetition Measures in Bilingual Preschoolers

This study aims to use a simple measure of verbal memory, a nonword repetition test, to identify 4 year olds at risk for language disorders. Preschoolers from inner-city and non-English speaking backgrounds are at risk for deficits in school readiness, particularly in the area of reading development, but it is difficult to identify which particular children experience this risk, especially in the context of economic deprivation and non-English speaking backgrounds. Nonword repetition tests, in which children are asked to repeat nonsense words of varying complexity (2-4 syllables) have been shown in a large body of research (e.g., Dollaghan & Campbell, 1998; Dispaldro, Leonard, & Deevy, 2013) to be reliable methods for identifying language learning problems in children. The present study uses a nonword repetition test designed to minimize the contribution of English language knowledge, to assess efficacy in identifying language learning difficulties in bilingual preschool children in low-income public preschools. Participants were administered nonword repetition tests by students who are fluent speakers of Spanish and Portuguese. Responses were audiorecorded and scored by trained raters blind to their language learning status. Percent correct scores for each child on the nonword repetition tests were computed, and differences in scores between the monolingual English speakers and the bilingual speakers were tested. Bilingual children showed no significant differences from monolingual English speakers on the nonword repetition test performance, suggesting that the tests are valid measures of their verbal memory capacity, and do not penalize bilingual children in obtaining this measure, which is known to predict success in learning to read

Genomic investigations of unexplained acute hepatitis in children

Since its first identification in Scotland, over 1,000 cases of unexplained paediatric hepatitis in children have been reported worldwide, including 278 cases in the UK1. Here we report an investigation of 38 cases, 66 age-matched immunocompetent controls and 21 immunocompromised comparator participants, using a combination of genomic, transcriptomic, proteomic and immunohistochemical methods. We detected high levels of adeno-associated virus 2 (AAV2) DNA in the liver, blood, plasma or stool from 27 of 28 cases. We found low levels of adenovirus (HAdV) and human herpesvirus 6B (HHV-6B) in 23 of 31 and 16 of 23, respectively, of the cases tested. By contrast, AAV2 was infrequently detected and at low titre in the blood or the liver from control children with HAdV, even when profoundly immunosuppressed. AAV2, HAdV and HHV-6 phylogeny excluded the emergence of novel strains in cases. Histological analyses of explanted livers showed enrichment for T cells and B lineage cells. Proteomic comparison of liver tissue from cases and healthy controls identified increased expression of HLA class 2, immunoglobulin variable regions and complement proteins. HAdV and AAV2 proteins were not detected in the livers. Instead, we identified AAV2 DNA complexes reflecting both HAdV-mediated and HHV-6B-mediated replication. We hypothesize that high levels of abnormal AAV2 replication products aided by HAdV and, in severe cases, HHV-6B may have triggered immune-mediated hepatic disease in genetically and immunologically predisposed children

Principles of Communication Assessment

Learning Objectives (Chapter 4). After reading this chapter, students will be able to: Describe the main functions of a communication assessment Define norm-referenced and criterion-referenced measures List the metrics commonly provided by standardized assessment tools Summarize the procedures used in a comprehensive communication assessment Describe the domains commonly evaluated in toddlers, children, and adult

The Timecourse of Phonological Competition in Spoken Word Recognition: A Comparison of Adults and Very Young Children

Spoken word recognition (SWR) is the mapping of speech sounds to words from many potential candidates in one’s lexicon. In adults, words that are phonetically similar, of high frequency, or semantically related compete for recognition. An ongoing debate in the literature is whether or not very young children encode spoken words with fine-grained temporal and phonetic detail. Specifically, whether they represent words wholistically or as smaller phonetic units similar to that of adults. The adult literature demonstrates that words that are phonetically similar at onset (cohorts) and offset (rhymes) compete for recognition. As it happens, rhymes have the potential to distinguish between developmental theories; some (wholistic-emergent) propose that children\u27s early representations lack phonetic and temporal detail, and therefore global similarity should be the primary determinant of lexical competition, while other theories (accessibility) propose that rhyme competition should not emerge until after the onset of literacy acquisition (due either directly to phonological reorganization spurred by learning to read, or coincidental maturation). This study compared phonological competition effects of cohort and rhymes compared to unrelated words using a simplified visual world paradigm task. Typically developing preschool children (n = 23), ages 3-4, and college students (n = 22), ages 18-22, were presented with two pictures and followed a spoken instruction to click on one of them (e.g., click on the doll ). Picture labels matched either onset (bat-bath), or offset (keys-bees), or were phonologically unrelated (bear-pants). Words were divided evenly between monosyllabic and bisyllabic words. Participants\u27 eye movements were recorded as they followed the verbal instruction. Children were generally slower than adults at processing spoken words but showed competition patterns similar to those seen in adults. Both adults and children showed weaker rhyme effects and stronger cohort effects for monosyllabic words. These findings suggest that rhyme competition emerges during pre-reading years, and also provides new insight into on-line lexical competition in adults and children

Technology and Communication Disorders

Learning objectives. After reading this chapter, students will be able to Define assistive technology Describe how technology is implemented within clinical practice Discuss how evidence-based decision making is employed when using technology List commonly used technology for expressive communication and assistive listening Discuss the issues related to the use of current technologie