Conversations with autistic children: Contingent relationships between features of adult input and children's response adequacy

The relationship between certain features of adult speech and autistic children's response adequacy was examined within the context of unstructured, dyadic conversations. On separate sessions, four verbal, nonecholalic children were observed talking with their mothers and teachers. Analysis of conversational turns showed that as the number of facilitating features contained in adults' eliciting utterances increased, the proportion of adequate replies from the children increased. In this analysis, facilitating features included the use of Yes/No questions, questions that were conceptually simple, and questions that were semantically contingent on the child's topic. In a further analysis, it was found that adults tended to modify their use of these features in response to child feedback, although this tendency was relatively small and observed only in a minority of the sequences evaluated. The findings are discussed in terms of pragmatic deficits associated with autism and implications for intervention with this population.This research was supported in part by grants from the Boston University Graduate School and the National Institute of Mental Health (MH 38704). We thank Michelle Pellerin, Deborah Hay, and John Houlihan for their assistance with data collection and analysis. We also gratefully acknowledge the assistance and patience of participating staff, parents, and children of the League School, Newton, Massachusetts.