related problems
Naser Ghafoori1 Associate Professor in TEFL
Department of English, Tabriz Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tabriz, Iran ghafoori@iaut.ac.ir; ghafoori_tefl@yahoo.com
Mobile: 09141160270
Heidar Ahmadi2
Ph.D Student in TEFL
Department of English, Tabriz Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tabriz, Iran heidarahmadi2012@gmail.com
Mobile: 09143914216
Abstract
Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a developmental disorder that normally becomes evident in the first three years of a child’s life. They have different kinds of problems in their language, speech, communication and behavior. This paper focuses on language related problems in the autism spectrum disorders (ASD) and common signs and symptoms of autistic children in different stages of their development. Being unaware of what kind of children can be placed as autistic in proper period of life, causes difficulties for autistic children in specific and for parents, teachers and educational system in general, so this paper tries to shed light on characteristics and features of autistic children and their common language, speech and communication related problems so that it may help to the diagnosis as soon as possible to take effective measures. Reviewing literature and different publications show that most autistic children do not make eye contact and have poor attention duration. They are often unable to use gestures either as a primary means of communication, as in sign language, or to assist verbal communication, such as pointing to an object they want. Some autistic individuals speak in a high-pitched voice or use robot-like speech. They are often unresponsive to the speech of others and may not respond to their own names.
Introduction
Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a developmental disorder that normally becomes evident in the first three years of a child’s life. It is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by impaired
social interaction, imagination, verbal and non-verbal communication, and restricted and repetitive behavior (Young, 2004; Christie, et al., 2009; American Psychiatric Association, 2000; Gabriels & Hill, 2007). Spencer & Simpson (2009) stated that there is considerable variation in the severity of autism and its impact on development, and it is considered a spectrum of disorders, or autism spectrum disorder (ASD). The term spectrum is used because children with autism differ widely from one another. Autism is found in children of all levels of ability, from those who are above average in their intelligence to those who have low intelligence wıth severe learning difficulties. Some children with autism may be able to read and perform academic skills close to grade level, while others will have considerably more severe cognitive problems. Some children with autism are fluent speakers, while others may be nonverbal. Thus, children with the same diagnosis will be different and they are given different words to describe diagnoses by doctors. The term ‘Autism Spectrum Disorder’ (ASD) refers to any one of the diagnoses like: “autism (childhood autism or autistic disorder), Asperger syndrome or Asperger disorder, Pervasive Developmental Disorder or Atypical autism, High functioning autism (Spencer & Simpson, 2009)”. It is a catch-all phrase to include all the diagnoses on the spectrum. Considerıng the causes for autism, it is believed that there is a biological basis for autism, with evidence of brain differences in individuals with ASD. The brain structures found to be involved include the cerebellum, cerebrum, limbic system, and brain stem (Prelock, 2006). Genetic studies with twins and siblings of individuals with autism support a genetic link for autism, although the exact nature is not clear. Other suggested causes such as dietary deficiencies, digestive problems, allergies, viruses, and environmental toxins have not been substantiated scientifically (Spencer & Simpson, 2009).
Possible Problems with Autistic Children
There are three areas of difficulty with autistic children according to Christie, et al. (2009); Williams & Wright (2004); Burkhardt (2008) and Lord & McGee (2001) as follows:
-difficulty with language and communication
Possible problems regarding language, speech and communication are going to be discussed in details in the following section, but other problems will be scrutinized in another paper later.
Language, Speech and Communication Problems in Autistic Children
Autistic or Non-verbal people do possess their own language system, external and internal speech. Most infants are born with an inbuilt ability to develop communication skills. In children on the autism spectrum these abilities are not as well developed. Some of the communication problems children experience come from difficulties such as “mindblindness and not getting the gist (Baghdashina, 2005)” that will be discussed in details, but children on the autism spectrum appear to have additional language difficulties. This varies very much from person to person and may be shown in a number of ways. Children with ASD may develop language later than other children and have limited receptive (understanding what is said) and expressive (knowing how to say things) language skills (Christie, et al., 2009 and Spencer & Simpson, 2009). On the other hand, children with Asperger syndrome will have apparently normal language development in infancy; problems only occur later when abstract language and the social use of language are being developed. There are different signs and symptoms for autistic children. Different aspects of language related problems in autistic children are described in details.
Cooing, babbling, gesturing and communicating in babies
At different times in their development babies will coo and babble in response to the noises an adult makes. This goes hand-in-hand with the mimicry of facial movements and smiling at faces. We now know that this is a result of genetic programming that gears babies up to respond to their caregivers. It is nature’s way of hooking parents in emotionally for the benefit of the child. In Autistic Children, absence of cooing and babbling, absence of or minimal eye contact, resistance to physical contact, failure to respond to their name, lack of gestures to communicate and lack of desire to interact are among common observable indicators and symptoms from early babyhood to fifteen months of age
Apparent regression and Repetitive noises or language
Some autistic children normally acquire words earlier at their life, but then stop talking altogether for several months and show apparent regression. Later, they start talking again with their slower rate of language development (Siegel, 2008). Some children with ASD may use language sounds in very vocal ways to screech, grunt or shout. The purpose of these noises is usually not communicative, although the noise may change in tone when the child is excited or angry. Toddlers with ASD who have some language skills may repeat phrases over and over again. These phrases may be unrelated to what is going on around them. A child may repeat made-up words (neologisms) or words they have heard (or misheard) from an adult or the television (echolalia) (Williams & Wright, 2004). Some children with ASD have language ability but don’t use language much to communicate, have their needs met, chat and solve their problems. This leads to frustration, loss of temper and other problems in them. Some people with ASD are aware of their needs and how to get what they want for themselves. However, they are not aware that other people can also help and so may not approach others, or they have unique ways of sorting out the problem in a way that is not acceptable to others.
Intonation and the production of sound and Mixing up pronouns:
Intonation and the way language is used may be different in children with ASD. The child may have an unusually flat, slightly expressionless tone of voice or may not regulate the volume of his voice. Their volume control seems stuck on loud!The classic picture of an autistic individual includes an impoverished ability to interpret or express emotion. The prosody of spoken language in autistic children is thought to lack emotional content (Hubbard & Trauner, 2007). Children with ASD may get the pronouns ‘I’ and ‘you’ mixed up: ‘You want a drink’ meaning ‘I want a drink’ (Boghdashina, 2005). They might also continue to refer to themselves by their own names, for example, ‘Jonathan
wants a biscuit’. Although these things happen to most children, those with ASD may struggle with
this concept for a great deal longer.
Williams & Wright (2004) discussed the following problems in autistic children when conversation develops.
1. Starting a conversation
The child’s introduction to a conversation may be unusual. For example, the child might find less-than-subtle ways of attracting the adult’s attention, maybe moving the adult’s head, pushing or pulling the person’s cloth so that he can talk to her or using the adult’s hand as if it were a tool.
The conversations of a child with ASD may be about factual information rather than being related to thoughts, feelings and opinions. Indeed, they may have some difficulty understanding what other people mean when they try to talk about their feelings.
3. Repetitive language and borrowed phrases
The language used by children with ASD may be repetitive rather than conversational. They may borrow phrases they have heard elsewhere, from a video, TV program, school or adults. These phrases are often used appropriately but have a slightly odd quality to them. Some professionals call this ‘delayed echolalia’ (Boghdashina, 2003).
4. One-sided conversation
The child may want to talk about his own interests, unaware and uninterested in the response. Even if someone is bored or giving cues that they want to get away, the child on the autism spectrum may not have noticed. Building on a conversation that doesn’t center on the child’s topic of interest may be difficult. Turn-taking in conversation is also difficult for these children. In fact, in many ways a conversation with one of them is not a conversation at all because a conversation implies a movement to and from, the giving and receiving of information that can lead in many directions. To those conversing with children on the autism spectrum this give and take often feels absent, and the listener may feel that the conversation is only going in one direction, controlled by the child with ASD.
5. Conversational speed
In a conversation the slow processing speed of a child with ASD may make the listener feel uncomfortable and want to stop the interaction. The level of detail from the young person on the autism spectrum may be far too great or sometimes too little, with few cues to the listener about what the conversation is about or where it is going. Sometimes a child with ASD may start a conversation halfway through the story, leaving his listener feeling very perplexed.
6. Miscommunication and literal understanding
Miscommunication is common among children with ASD. For example, the young person may misinterpret what is said. She may hear ‘We’re not going to the park’ as ‘going park’. She may have difficulty weaving all parts of the sentence into an understood whole or may not understand the crucial importance of the word ‘not’ that reverses the whole meaning. Another example of miscommunication is literal understanding. The child may understand the teacher’s words ‘Take your seats’ in class as an instruction. He may pick up his chair and want to know where to take it.
It is necessary to highlight that children with ASD communicate differently from normally developing children. According to Williams & Wright (2004) and Boghdashina (2005), Autistic children are often unaware of the needs of their listeners and do not pick up the non-verbal clues in people’s faces. Their behavior can sometimes appear to be cheeky because they have not grasped the gist of a comment within a particular social setting. One girl was reprimanded by her teacher when she walked out of the classroom with her pencil after her teacher asked all of the children to, ‘Take out your pencils’.
Understanding language appears to require a great deal more concentration from children with ASD than for other children. It is not surprising that they sometimes ‘switch off ’, ignore us or seek comfort in some repetitive familiar tasks. For those children who are very slow in learning about communication or have very little or no speech, there is still a great deal that can be done to help.
The semantics and pragmatics of language
Christie, et al., (2009) stated that one of the major difficulties for children with autism is in developing social empathy in the same way as other children. Typically developing children move steadily towards becoming competent communicators during their first year of life through their repeated interactions and dialogues with adults, through what are known as the ‘pragmatics’ of language. These pragmatics include body language (such as gesture, facial expression, eye-contact, posture and stance), listening skills, using intonation and volume, understanding intention, sharing understanding and turn-taking.
opportunities at a very early age because of the difficulties they have in making sense of these pragmatics, which are the building- blocks, or first steps, in developing communication.
Getting the Gist: (from a picture, a sentence in a book, the real world)
Normally, people have the ability to draw together lots of information from a situation in order to make sense of it. They can see the whole picture. According to Williams & Wright (2004), this is called the ‘drive for central coherence’ (They call it ‘getting the gist’). For example, if people heard church bells and saw a large group of people dressed up in fine clothes and hats, throwing confetti at a couple outside a church, they might guess that this was a wedding. Children with ASD appear to experience great difficulty in drawing together information in this way to understand the gist of what is going on or what is expected from them. In the example of the wedding given above, the child with ASD might focus on the church bells, or the pieces of paper floating around, but fail to recognize the event as a wedding. If students were sitting in a classroom and the teacher said, ‘Take your pencils out’, they might understand that a lesson was about to begin and they we would be expected to write something down. People relate the details of the words in the sentence to the context. A child with ASD, however, might quite literally take his pencil out of the room. In other words, children with ASD have difficulty getting the gist. They may not understand the overall meaning when presented with the details. They may become preoccupied with detail. This difficulty in getting the gist applies to the child’s use of language as well as his understanding of pictures, stories, events and objects. Children with autism may jump to the wrong conclusion because they have problems referring context and detail backwards and forwards to each other. Most people do it intuitively without thinking about it.
People are able to get the gist of the meaning of phrases and sentences intuitively, but sometimes they make mistakes. You may be able to recall situations yourself when you have focused on a particular word in a sentence incorrectly. The whole meaning of the sentence and the social intent that surrounded it may have been lost. For children with difficulties on the autism spectrum, their own language may seem as confusing as foreign languages seem to the majority of people. Often this is because they struggle to get the gist of the situation because they fail to understand the meaning of words within the correct context.
person on the autism spectrum to make social blunders that cause all kinds of problems by not caring for their feelings, interests and thinking. ‘Mindblindness’ refers to being blind to the minds of other people. It means that people with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASDs) have great difficulty understanding the point of view or the thoughts or feelings of someone else. Some researchers have called this poor ‘Theory of Mind’, as shorthand for saying that children with ASD have poor understanding of what other people are thinking or feeling: a poor understanding of the minds of others. ‘Theory of Mind’ (TOM) refers to our ability to make accurate guesses about what people might be thinking or feeling or help us to predict what they are going to do. This is a crucial skill for being able to get on socially. Mindblindness is where we have problems with this. A child with severe autism may have a totally impaired TOM but more often TOM is developmentally delayed. In other words, children on the autism spectrum develop these skills later and to a lesser degree than others. There are different signs and symptoms for autistic children. Parents and teachers should care for them in order to take proper decisions in instructing, educating and treating with them. Most scholars including Williams & Wright (2004) believe that in the first six months, there are no obvious
symptoms for autistic children, but they generally seem to be very passive, distraught or inconsolable babies. Some babies rarely look at their parents faces or eyes and do little babbling or imitating of their parent’s movements or sounds.
They further explained that as a general rule, from six to twelve months children can usually crawl or move about, stand with support, say single words such as ‘momma’ or ‘dada’ and use simple gestures such as waving ‘bye bye’. If your child has not reached these milestones, he or she may develop these skills over the following few months, but in case of delay, the child’s progress should be monitored by health professionals. This does not necessarily mean that your child has ASD, but may signal other general developmental difficulties, speech and language delay or delay in physical development. Children should be using two words together with meaning by the age of 24 months and failure to do this, or any loss of language in this period, is a reason for you to see a health professional. Some children with ASD will have learnt skills which they then appear to lose. In particular, some children with ASD gain and subsequently appear to lose language skills.
• impaired nonverbal behaviors such as eye contact, facial expressions, body posture, and gestures • not sharing enjoyment, interests, or achievements with others, such as by leading others to, pointing to, or showing off things of interest
• playing alone rather than showing interest in playing with other children
• showing an unusual reaction to distress in others, for instance ignoring them or laughing
• standing out as behaving differently at playgroup; for example, they may continue to wander around the room when the other children are sitting down at story time
• using language that may seem different from that of the other children at nursery. For example, they may:
- have very little language or a great deal of language (but this may be very repetitive or verbose) - repeat phrases from films, videos or TV programs or copy phrases she has just heard
- have difficulty understanding
• having little or no interest in pretend play or being puzzled by the imaginative play of other children • not interested in joining in group games or may be insistent on playing them in a particular way • very preoccupied with particular games or toys (i.e. playing with the same thing every day for many hours at a time) and becomes extremely upset if prevented from continuing
• preoccupied with unusual things for a young child, such as lamp posts, grids, potato peelers, maps, road signs, traffic lights, logos
• have difficulty making sense of the way adults talk to them from a very early age: not just the words, but the whole of ‘conversation’, with its finely timed two-way flow, eye-contact and other social signals
• insisting on things being the same – for example ornaments being in exactly the same position • showing a liking for routine – for example having to go into a particular room and sit on a particular chair before doing anything else
• making unusual movements such as spinning round or rocking repeatedly
• making unusual hand or finger movements such as flapping his hands or moving his fingers in front of his eyes
• fascinated by patterns or movement in everyday objects such as lining up books or cars and moving her hand back and forth repeatedly, watching the patterns she makes
• sensitivity to touch, e.g. stroking items for long periods of time or hating the feel of certain fabrics to the point of distress
Many of these behaviors can be seen in children who are developing in a healthy way. However, in that case they usually stop after a few days or weeks. You should see your doctor if you are worried. Generally, problems on the autism spectrum are detected before a young person reaches adolescence. Some autistic children will have more subtle difficulties (especially Asperger syndrome) and they may have escaped the notice of those around them until they are older and social skills are required more. As a child becomes older adults and peers are less tolerant of wide variations in social behavior than they are when the child is in infancy. Social difficulties begin to stick out more as the child grows. They signs and symptoms from six to seventeen years of age are the same as those mentioned for children from three to five years. They continue most of the problems outlined above in social behaviors, verbal and non-verbal communication, learning, speech and language, but they are highlighted in social and interactional aspects of autistic children.
Children with ASD have problems in social relationships, social understanding, thinking, imagination and behavior. Some the common problems in these aspects are as follows: mindblindness, poor use of facial expressions, imagination difficulties, problems in (playing, problem-solving, getting on with others, sense of humor, understanding abstract concepts ,literal thinking, time perception, planning, memory), problematic interest in parts of objects and pictures , difficulty with sensory and visual interests and sensitivities: temperature, vibration, touch and texture, smell, taste, sound, pain, gestalt perception, hypersensitivity (hypervision, hyperhearing, olfactory hypersensitivities, hypertactile, vestibular hypersensitivity, proprioceptive hypersensitivity), and hyposensitivity (hypo-vision , hypohearing, hypotaste or hyposmell , hypotactility , vestibular hyposensitivity , proprioceptive hyposensitivity, hypoproprioceptive ).
Conclusion:
Communicating verbally and non-verbally
Relating to others and the world around them(social problems)
Thinking and behaving flexibly
There are different opinions among doctors, parents, and experts about what causes autism and how best to treat it, and much that we still don’t know. But on one fact, everyone agrees: early and intensive intervention helps. Parents are in the best position to spot the earliest warning signs of autism. They know their child better than anyone. They should know what’s normal and what’s not. They are advised to monitor their child’s development, take action if they are concerned and not to accept a wait-and-see approach.
If autism is caught in infancy, treatment can take full advantage of the young brain’s remarkable plasticity. Although autism is hard to diagnose before 24 months, symptoms often surface between 12 and 18 months. If signs are detected by 18 months of age, intensive treatment may help to rewire the brain and reverse the symptoms. The earliest signs of autism involve the absence of normal behaviors —not the presence of abnormal ones—so they can be tough to spot. In some cases, the earliest symptoms of autism are even misinterpreted as signs of a “good baby,” since the infant may seem quiet, independent, and undemanding. However, you can catch warning signs early if you know what to look for.
While there's no proven cure yet for autism spectrum disorder (ASD), treating ASD early, using school-based programs, knowing how to treat them and getting proper medical care can greatly reduce ASD symptoms and increase your child's ability to grow and learn new skills (Magnusen, 2005). Research has shown that intensive behavioral therapy during the toddler or preschool years can significantly improve cognitive and language skills in young children with ASD.
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