TY - JOUR
T1 - Is grammar spared in autism spectrum disorder?
T2 - Data from Judgments of Verb Argument Structure Overgeneralization Errors
AU - Ambridge, B.
AU - Bannard, C.
AU - Jackson, Georgina H.
N1 - Funding Information:
We thank the children, parents and teachers who made this research possible. This study was funded by a grant from the Leverhulme Trust (RPG-158). Ben Ambridge and Colin Bannard are Reader and Lecturer in Psychology in the International Centre for Language and Communicative Development (LuCiD) at The University of Liverpool. The support of the Economic and Social Research Council [ES/L008955/1] is gratefully acknowledged.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2015, Springer Science+Business Media New York.
PY - 2015/10/22
Y1 - 2015/10/22
N2 - Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) aged 11–13 (N = 16) and an IQ-matched typically developing (TD) group aged 7–12 (N = 16) completed a graded grammaticality judgment task, as well as a standardized test of cognitive function. In a departure from previous studies, the judgment task involved verb argument structure overgeneralization errors (e.g., *Lisa fell the cup off the shelf) of the type sometimes observed amongst typically developing children, as well as grammatical control sentences with the same verbs (e.g., The cup fell off the shelf). The ASD group showed a smaller dispreference for ungrammatical sentences (relative to the control sentences) than did the TD group. These findings are indicative of a subtle grammatical impairment in even relatively high-functioning children with ASD.
AB - Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) aged 11–13 (N = 16) and an IQ-matched typically developing (TD) group aged 7–12 (N = 16) completed a graded grammaticality judgment task, as well as a standardized test of cognitive function. In a departure from previous studies, the judgment task involved verb argument structure overgeneralization errors (e.g., *Lisa fell the cup off the shelf) of the type sometimes observed amongst typically developing children, as well as grammatical control sentences with the same verbs (e.g., The cup fell off the shelf). The ASD group showed a smaller dispreference for ungrammatical sentences (relative to the control sentences) than did the TD group. These findings are indicative of a subtle grammatical impairment in even relatively high-functioning children with ASD.
KW - Adolescent Autism Spectrum Disorder Child Female Generalization, Psychological Humans Judgment Language Development Linguistics Male Autism spectrum disorders Grammaticality judgment task Language development Verb argument structure overgeneralization err
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84941937001&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1007/s10803-015-2487-5
DO - 10.1007/s10803-015-2487-5
M3 - Article
C2 - 26048042
AN - SCOPUS:84941937001
SN - 0162-3257
VL - 45
SP - 3288
EP - 3296
JO - Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders
JF - Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders
IS - 10
ER -