Language and Autism

There are three general areas where children with autism show severe impairments - language, social skills and behavioral flexibility. One of the questions raised in class has to do with whether language problems are a primary symptom (meaning, they comes out of the neurobiological processes that cause autism) or are secondary (language difficulties develop because of deficits in other areas). A recent important review helps to answer this question. The authors of this review describe research on language problems in autism and in those with "specific language impairment" (SLI) - a diagnosis thought by some to be part of autism (Williams, Botting & Boucher, 2008). In fact, there is relatively little overlap in the genetics and brain involvement in these two groups. This suggests that the neurobiological processes that lead to autism are different than those that lead to SLI.

One explanation of the language problems in autism is that they are secondary to the social skills problems. According to this view, children with autism are born (or quickly develop) a lack of interest or aversion to other people. In turn, they have a difficult time with lanuguage because most of what we communicate involves interacting with other people. If a child doesn't like to interact with others - what would motivate him or her to learn to communicate? This is what is meant by language problems being secondary - they may develop differently because of their social motivational problems.

The implication for early intervention, then, is to try to get children with autism to associate other people with positive things and to teach them to interact socially to get what they want and need. If you can improve their interest in other people, this should help them be more motivated to learn verbal and non-verbal communication skills.

Reference: Williams, D., Botting, N., & Boucher, J. (2008). Language in autism and specific language impairment: Where are the links? Psychological Bulletin, 134(6), 944-963.