Judgment-of-Learning In Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Background: Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is characterised by a specific memory profile of spared semantic (factual memory) and relatively impaired episodic memory (memory for events) (see Boucher and Bowler, 2008). Despite the suggestion that being aware of one’s own memory abilities affects memory and academic performance (Pierce & Lange, 2000), this area has rarely been explored in autism (Farrant et al., 1999; Wilkinson et al., 2010). The metamemory framework proposed by Nelson and Narens (1990) offers reliable ways to measure awareness of memory abilities. According to this framework, metamemory consists of knowledge about memory functioning (e.g., influence of the task or the material on the memory performance) but also monitoring processes allowing individuals to assess their memory performance during learning. This monitoring function is crucial as it will then influence which memory strategies will be implemented and will thus affect memory performance.

Objectives: The novelty of this study was to explore monitoring abilities in autism by asking ASD children to make Judgments-of-learning (JOLs, Nelson and Dunlosky, 1991). JOLs are predictions, made immediately after the presentation of the item or after a delay, about future test performance on recently studied items (Nelson and Narens, 1994). Several studies show that children can make accurate JOLs (e.g. Schneider et al., 2000; Koriat & Shitzer-Reichert, 2002). However, Theory of Mind impairments and neuropathological findings in autism lead to the prediction that JOLs might be inaccurate in ASD children.

Methods: 21 ASD children and 21 typical children were included in this study. There were no significant group differences on age and IQ (t(40)=1.52, p=.14 and t(40) =-1.07, p=.29 respectively). All participants were tested in the immediate and delayed JOL conditions. In the immediate condition, participants were presented with 24 word pairs and immediately after the presentation of each pair were asked to predict whether or not they will be able to recall the target at a later (immediate JOL). In the delayed condition children saw a different set of 24 word pairs. After all items were presented participants were showed the cue word and asked to make their JOLs (delayed JOL). JOL accuracy was measured by the relationship between the judgments and the recall performance (Gamma, Nelson, 1984).

Results: Overall there were no group differences neither on the immediate nor delayed JOLs. For both groups, delayed JOLs were more accurate. However, unlike for the typical children (ɣ=.27); immediate JOL gamma was at chance levels in the ASD group (ɣ=.05), suggesting inaccuracy in the ASD group.

Conclusions: The findings suggest some difficulties in ASD children when asked to predict their future memory performance (immediate JOL), thus suggesting difficulties in estimating memory performance accurately in this population. Results are interpreted in relation to recent memory theories and Theory-of-mind abilities.