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Production and comprehension of French wh-questions by children with autism spectrum disorder: A comparative study with specific language impairment

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 May 2017

PHILIPPE PRÉVOST ,
LAURICE TULLER ,
MARIE ANNE BARTHEZ ,
JOËLLE MALVY  and
FRÉDÉRIQUE BONNET-BRILHAULT
PHILIPPE PRÉVOST*
Affiliation:
Université François Rabelais de Tours
LAURICE TULLER
Affiliation:
Université François Rabelais de Tours
MARIE ANNE BARTHEZ
Affiliation:
Tours Regional University Hospital Center
JOËLLE MALVY
Affiliation:
Université François Rabelais de Tours and Clocheville Children's Hospital, Tours
FRÉDÉRIQUE BONNET-BRILHAULT
Affiliation:
Université François Rabelais de Tours and Clocheville Children's Hospital, Tours
*
ADDRESS FOR CORRESPONDENCE Philippe Prévost, UMR Inserm U930, Université François Rabelais de Tours, Tours, France. E-mail: philippe.prevost@univ-tours.fr
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Abstract

The nature of structural language difficulties in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) was explored in a comparative study with specific language impairment (SLI) through investigation of the frequently reported ASD weakness in receptive skills relative to expressive skills. Twenty French-speaking children with ASD aged 6 to 12 were compared to age-matched children with SLI on production and comprehension of wh-questions. The two groups displayed similar effects of the complexity of the different wh-strategies. In the ASD group (as in the SLI group), these effects were not greater in comprehension compared to production; moreover, nonverbal ability (which varied from normal to impaired) was not related to language performance. Observed ASD-SLI differences are argued to largely be due to ASD pragmatic deficits, rather than to a qualitative difference in structural language skills.

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Applied Psycholinguistics , Volume 38 , Issue 5 , September 2017 , pp. 1095 - 1131
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017 

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References

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