Poor metaphor comprehension was considered a hallmark of autism spectrum disorder (ASD), but recent research has questioned the extent and the sources of these difficulties. In this cross-sectional study, we compared metaphor comprehension in individuals with ASD (N = 29) and individuals with typical development (TD; N = 31), and investigated the…

Deficits in working memory have not been fully explored in toddlers and preschoolers with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). We investigated the relationship between language (verbal ability, verbal self-talk) and visuospatial working memory in 2- and 4-year-olds with ASD (n = 65) and typical development (TD) (n = 54). Children with ASD displayed…

There is currently limited research and a lack of consensus on emotional processing impairments among adults with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). The present pilot study sought to characterize the extent to which adults with ASD are impaired in processing emotions in both words and pictures. Ten adults with ASD rated word and picture stimuli on…

"Beta"-adrenergic antagonism (e.g. propranolol) has been associated with cognitive/behavioral benefits following stress-induced impairments and for some cognitive/behavioral domains in individuals with autism spectrum disorder. In this preliminary investigation, we examined whether the benefits of propranolol are associated with…

The conclusions on prosodic pitch features in autism spectrum disorders (ASD) have primarily been derived from studies in non-tonal language speakers. This cross-linguistic study evaluated the performance of imitating Cantonese lexical tones and their non-linguistic (nonspeech) counterparts by Cantonese- and Mandarin-speaking children with and…

This article discusses the relationship between the mental intelligence of children with autism and their capability in understanding the complexity of sentence structure represented in utterances performed by their teachers. In addition, this study also explains the complexity of the sentence structure produced by the autistic children in…

While many individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) experience difficulties with language processing, non-linguistic semantic processing may be intact. We examined neural responses to an implicit semantic priming task by comparing N400 responses--an event-related potential related to semantic processing--in response to semantically related…

In typical development, listeners can use semantic content of verbs to facilitate incremental language processing--a skill that is associated with existing language skills. Studies of children with ASD have not identified an association between incremental language processing in semantically-constraining contexts and language skills, perhaps…

Children with autism spectrum disorders have been reported to be less influenced by a speaker's face during speech perception than those with typically development. To more closely examine these reported differences, a novel visual phonemic restoration paradigm was used to assess neural signatures (event-related potentials [ERPs]) of audiovisual…

Sentence comprehension relies on the abilities to rapidly integrate different types of linguistic and non-linguistic information. The present study investigated whether Mandarin-speaking preschool children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are able to use verb information predictively to anticipate the upcoming linguistic input during real-time…

We examined semantic processing in ASD children by presenting sentences with congruent or incongruent final words and visual narratives with congruent or incongruent final panels. An N400 effect to incongruent words appeared as compared to congruent ones, which was attenuated for the ASD children. We observed a negativity sustained to incongruous…

Behaviors such as gaze aversion and repetitive movements are commonly believed to be signs of deception and low credibility; however, they may also be characteristic of individuals with developmental or mental health conditions. We examined the effect of five behaviors that are common among autistic individuals--gaze aversion, repetitive…

Recent research has suggested that temporal sequencing of narrative events might be a domain-general ability that underlies oral narrative capacities. The current study investigated this issue in a group of children with known pragmatic and narrative difficulties, namely Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). We hypothesized (1) that children with ASD (n…

Background: It has been established that people with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) often have difficulties understanding spoken language. Understanding reflexive and clitic pronouns is vital to establishing reference-based inference, but it is as yet unclear whether such constructions pose specific difficulties for those with ASD. Pronoun…

Autism spectrum disorder is a neurodevelopmental disorder that is characterized by impairments in social communication, restricted interests, and repetitive behaviors. Many studies have demonstrated atypical responses to audiovisual sensory inputs, particularly those containing sociolinguistic information. It is currently unclear whether these…