Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and Specific Language Impairment (SLI) are disorders of communication that are sometimes thought to show similar structural language difficulties. Recent research has even suggested that they might be aetiologically related. However, it may be that standardized language tasks are not sensitive enough to detect…

Prosody carries a lot of information relevant for our understanding of spoken messages. In addition, prosody plays an important role in signalling attitudes and emotions. Prosodic features also constitute an important resource that participants use to achieve mutual understanding in interaction. The aim of this study was to point to possible…

Difficulties with figurative language have been highlighted by many researchers and people with autistic spectrum disorders (ASDs) as a core problem of the condition. However, few tests exist which describe and assess the responses of children with autism to figurative language. This paper reports a study which evaluated figurative language skills…