Vocabulary checklists completed by caregivers are a common way of measuring children's vocabulary knowledge. We provide evidence from checklist data from 31 children with and without autism spectrum disorder. When asked to report twice about whether or not their child produces a particular word, caregivers are largely consistent in their…

Trajectories of expressive language development are highly heterogeneous in autism. Yoder et al. found that parental responsiveness, child response to joint attention, child communicative intent and consonant inventory were unique predictors of expressive language growth in minimally verbal preschoolers 16 months later (n = 87). This study applied…

Children with developmental disabilities (DD) may experience delays in their ability to speak and communicate with their parents, peers, and others. These children often benefit from evidence-based, parent-implemented communication interventions. In the current study, two mothers were trained and coached to use storybook reading techniques and…

In 2 cross-lagged, longitudinal studies we contrasted parental talk about want in a single context versus multiple contexts. Study 1 examined thirty-two 2 year olds, with mothers describing pictures to children. Mothers could use want in zero, one, or multiple contexts. Children whose mothers used want in multiple contexts experienced a…

Adult responsiveness is related to language development both in young typically developing children and in children with autism spectrum disorders, such that parents who use more responsive language with their children have children who develop better language skills over time. This study used a micro-analytic technique to examine how two facets…

This study evaluated a technology-based early intervention for social communication skills in pre-schoolers in a randomised controlled trial. Participants were 54 children aged under 6 years with a diagnosis of autism, assigned to either intervention or control conditions. The app engaged children, who played consistently, regardless of…

Background: Mothers facilitate their young hearing children's word learning by making reference explicit for novel words through physical designation (e.g., with deictic gestures) and by isolating words in simple syntactic frames. As children's language skills develop, such modifications decrease. Less is known about hearing mothers' support to…