Group items tagged

These results suggest that nonverbal children have specifically impaired imitation and pointing skills.

The ASD performed worse than the typically developing group across the entire grammaticality judgment task. However, the authors noted that the groups did NOT differ when the sentences were short or medium length. That is, the apparent relative weaker performance among the ASD group was mostly during long sentences. In addition, these group differences were more pronounced when the error was located at the end of long sentences. This indicates that the group differences may be due to difficulty in working memory and attention among the autism group.

However, it is unlikely that these findings are only attributable to working memory problems. Specifically, the ASD groups showed impaired performance only to some type grammatical errors but not others. That is, the ASD group had difficulty identifying omissions and substitution errors, but did not show difficulty identifying order or insertion errors. This suggests that attention and working memory difficulties interact with some unique deficits in grammaticality judgment.

When compared to children with non-ASD developmental delays, children with autism had significantly more tactile sensitivity, auditory anomalies (low response), and taste/smell sensitivity.

in this study the authors wanted to determine whether sensory abnormalities would differentiate between children with ASD and children with other developmental conditions.

When compared to the children with non-ASD developmental delays, the children with autism had significantly more tactile sensitivity, auditory anomalies (low response), and taste/smell sensitivity. The authors did not find differences between the two groups in visual or auditory over-sensitivity.

Childhood Disintegrative Disorder This rather rare condition was described many years before autism (Heller, 1908) but has only recently been 'officially' recognized.

The condition develops in children who have previously seemed perfectly normal. Typically language, interest in the social environment, and often toileting and self-care abilities are lost, and there may be a general loss of interest in the environment. The child usually comes to look very 'autistic', i.e., the clinical presentation (but not the history) is then typical of a child with autism.

A special educator in Vienna, Theodore Heller, proposed the term dementia infantilis to account for the condition.