Phonetic and phonological errors in children with high functioning autism and Asperger syndrome

Abstract

This study involved a qualitative analysis of speech errors in children with autism spectrum disorders (ASDs). Participants were 69 children aged 5-13 years; 30 had high functioning autism and 39 had Asperger syndrome. On a standardised test of articulation, the minority (12%) of participants presented with standard scores below the normal range, indicating a speech delay/ disorder. Although all the other children had standard scores within the normal range, a sizeable proportion (33% of those with normal standard scores) presented with a small number of errors.Overall 41% of the group produced at least some speech errors.The speech of children with ASD was characterised by mainly developmental phonological processes (gliding, cluster reduction and final consonant deletion most frequently), but nondevelopmental error types (such as phoneme specific nasal emission and initial consonant deletion) were found both in children identified as performing below the normal range in the standardised speech test and in those who performed within the normal range. Nondevelopmental distortions occurred relatively frequently in the children with ASD and previous studies of adolescents and adults with ASDs shows similar errors, suggesting that they do not resolve over time. Whether or not speech disorders are related specifically to ASD, their presence adds an additional communication and social barrier and should be diagnosed and treated as early as possible in individual children. Speech in ASD 3Articulation and phonology skills are often a relative strength in children with autism spectrum disorders (ASDs), with most studies reporting either age-appropriate or superior speech compared to other expressive language abilities (Rapin & Dunn, 2003). Kjelgaard and TagerFlusberg (2001, p. 287) studied 89 children with ASD and concluded that "among the children with autism there was significant heterogeneity in their language skills, but across all the children, articulation skills were spared". An earlier study by Boucher (1976) reached a similar conclusion. She used the Edinburgh Articulation Test (Anthony, Bogle, Ingram, & McIsaac, 1971) to compare articulation in children with autism, delayed language development and receptive dysphasia. The results showed that the children with autism had superior articulation compared to the children in the other two groups.However, a recent study by Rapin et al. (2009) has shown that a significant proportion of children with ASD do present with impaired speech. They used standard scores from an articulation test to drive cluster analysis of language abilities in 62 school-aged children with ASD (mean age 8;6) and proposed two main types of language disorders in this age group: severe impairment in expressive phonology (24%) and borderline/normal phonology with impaired comprehension (76%). Since there was no analysis of the actual errors made by the children it is not possible to know whether they were presenting with a delayed or disordered profile.Some earlier studies suggest th...

Can Asperger syndrome be distinguished from autism? An anatomic likelihood meta-analysis of MRI studies

“…5,6,8 Others take an opposite stance. Asperger syndrome and autism present with distinct verbal styles, [18][19][20] motor signs, 21 emotion perception 22 and pragmatic reasoning. 23 There are critical differences in processing strategies adopted by individuals with Asperger syndrome and those with autism.…”

Longitudinal Study of High and Low Functioning Preschool Children with ASD and the Progress Made Following Therapeutic Intervention

“…Also, in a longitudinal study of seven years, Anderson et al (2007) found that at the age of 9 years 29.7% of the children who participated in the study never developed speech. In two other studies (Cleland, Gibbon, Peppé, O'Hare, & Rutherford, 2010;Rapin et al, 2009) 33% of 3 to 9 years old children presented with delayed speech, phonological difficulties and speech disorders that remained even after therapy. Furthermore the percentage of children with ASD who present with feeding disorders reaches 46% to 89% (Ledford & Gast, 2006;Kodak & Piazza, 2008).…”

Vocalization Rate and Consonant Production in Toddlers at High and Low Risk for Autism

“…However, for these toddlers it may be reflected in more subtle aspects of speech production that were not examined here, such as use of intonation or percent consonants correct in words. Older verbal children with ASD have been shown to produce unusual intonational contours in speech and a higher rate of residual speech errors (Cleland et al, 2010;Shriberg et al, 2011).…”

“…Some researchers (e.g., Kjelgaard & Tager-Flusberg, 2001) have found that speech ability in older children with ASD is in the average range, even when language and cognitive ability are not. Other researchers (Cleland, Gibbon, Peppé, O'Hare, & Rutherford, 2010;Rapin, Dunn, Allen, Stevens, & Fein, 2009;Shriberg et al, 2011) have identified subgroups of children with ASD with impaired speech production. These differing results highlight the heterogeneity of speech production ability in children with ASD.…”