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Assessing Social Cognition and Pragmatic Language in Adolescents with Traumatic Brain Injuries

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 February 2013

Skye McDonald ,
Therese English ,
Rebekah Randall ,
Thea Longman ,
Leanne Togher  and
Robyn L. Tate
Skye McDonald*
Affiliation:
School of Psychology, University of New South Wales, Australia
Therese English
Affiliation:
School of Psychology, University of New South Wales, Australia
Rebekah Randall
Affiliation:
School of Psychology, University of New South Wales, Australia
Thea Longman
Affiliation:
School of Psychology, University of New South Wales, Australia
Leanne Togher
Affiliation:
School of Psychology, University of New South Wales, Australia
Robyn L. Tate
Affiliation:
School of Psychology, University of New South Wales, Australia
*
Correspondence and reprint requests to: Skye McDonald, School of Psychology, University of New South Wales, Sydney 2052, Australia. E-mail: s.mcdonald@unsw.edu.au
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Abstract

Traumatic brain injuries (TBI) in children and adolescents can impair social cognition and communication skills but there are few assessment tools suitable for adolescents. The Awareness of Social Inference Test (TASIT) uses professionally enacted audiovisual vignettes of everyday conversational exchanges and is a valid measure of social perception disorders in adults. This study examined its utility for assessing impairments in social cognition in a group of 16 adolescents with TBI, compared to a group of 16 typically developing (TD) adolescents. Adolescents with TBI were, on average, no different to their TD peers on TASIT 1 (emotion recognition) and TASIT 3 (recognizing lies and sarcasm when provided with additional cues) but performed more poorly on TASIT 2 which required them to interpret sarcastic and sincere conversational exchanges with few cues other than the demeanor of the speakers. Within the TBI group, poor performance on TASIT correlated to both relative and self-reported communication difficulties at home. It also correlated with IQ, face recognition and severity of injury as indexed by duration of post-traumatic amnesia. Overall, this study suggests TASIT is a valid measure for adolescents although it raised questions as to how effective normative data is for comparing performance in social cognition during childhood and adolescence. (JINS, 2013, 19, 1–11)

Keywords

EmotionTheory of mindPragmaticsSarcasmBrain injuryAdolescence
Type
Special Series
Information
Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society , Volume 19 , Issue 5 , May 2013 , pp. 528 - 538
Copyright
Copyright © The International Neuropsychological Society 2013

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