Production of Wh-Questions in Young Children with Autism

Background: Children with autism, by definition, show marked impairments in their language and communication skills. Asking and responding to questions is an important aspect of early social interactions. However, Wh-questions are especially impoverished in the language of children with autism. Previous studies have focused primarily on Wh-question use in experimental settings and across a wide age range. The current report examines the progression of Wh-questions by young children with autism in detail, making comparisons with typically-developing children matched on vocabulary. This research is part of a longitudinal study in which children are visited every four months across a 3-year time span to investigate the language development of young children with autism. This report includes production data from visits 2-4.

Objectives: We investigated the progression of various aspects of Wh-question production in 3-year-old children with autism, and vocabulary-matched typically developing children.

Methods: Mothers and children participated in 30-minute structured play sessions at each visit. At visit 2, the 10 typically developing toddlers (TYP: mean age = 24.68 months), and 10 children with autism (ASD: mean age = 35.40 months) were matched on expressive vocabulary (mean CDI scores = 375 and 369, respectively). Transcripts of the sessions were coded by (a) total number of Wh-questions, (b) number of different Wh-questions, (c) number of different Wh-words, (d) percent of total utterances that contained a Wh-question, and (e) percent of total utterances that were Wh-questions with a predicate.

Results: At visit 2, the ASD group produced fewer Wh-questions than the TYP group (Ms = 7.4 (TYP) and 4.5 (ASD)). However, they did not differ in the number of different Wh-questions, number of different Wh-words, percent of total utterances that were Wh-questions, or the percent of total utterances that were Wh-questions with predicates. Between visits 2 and 3, the TYP group showed considerable increases in every category; for example, their number of different Wh-words increased from 1.7 to 2.6 and their percentage of total utterances that were Wh-questions with a predicate increased from 1.4 to 3.1, whereas the ASD group showed increases in number of Wh-questions (to 7.1) but not in measures (c-e). Furthermore, from visits 3 to 4, the TYP group continued to grow in Wh-question use and complexity whereas the ASD group showed little increase in Wh-question use. The TYP children also showed greater increases in expressive vocabulary between visits 2 and 3 (on average, a 150-word increase) than the ASD children did (on average, 50-word increase).

Conclusions: When matched to typical children on expressive vocabulary at visit 2, children with autism produce fewer Wh-questions, but otherwise show little difference in the types of Wh-questions that they use. However, the TYP group progressed dramatically in their use of Wh-questions between visits 2 and 3, while the ASD group showed little improvement across the time studied. This demonstrates that children with autism are not only delayed in the onset of Wh-question use, but also progress much more slowly. Further analyses will explore how much Wh-question growth is a function of general language growth.