Too Much, Too Little, Too Late: Structure of Personal Narratives of Emerging Adults with and without Autism Spectrum Disorder

Background:  Problems with pragmatic language are the major defining linguistic characteristic of autism. Narrative is an aspect of pragmatic language that has not received much attention in individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASD). Personal narratives have received even less attention in this population despite being more functional than fictional ones. Prior studies have mostly focused on children rather than adults with ASD.

Objectives:   Our main objective was to collect personal narratives from adolescents and young adults on the autism spectrum and compare them to matched typically developing adolescents and young adults. Personal narratives are the way we form and maintain relationships with others, including friends, family, teachers, doctors, law enforcement individuals, among others. We were interested in the challenges with personal narrative experienced by those with ASD.

Methods:   We used the Conversational Map Approach (McCabe & Rollins, 1994) to collect personal narratives in conversation from those with ASD and a matched comparison group. Interviews were then transcribed and the narratives identified. Narratives were scored using High Point Analysis.

Results:   As hypothesized, narratives from individuals with ASD were significantly less complex in high point structure compared to their typically developing peers. There were no significant differences between the groups on three other measures, length in words, length in propositions, or words per proposition. Individuals in the comparison group produced significantly more conjunctions per proposition than did individuals with ASD.

Conclusions: As predicted, emerging adults with ASD produced narratives that were significantly poorer in quality than their typically developing peers, though the narratives of the two groups did not differ in length (in words or propositions) or sentence complexity. The profile of narrative structures for those with ASD was very different - they either included too much detail or not enough detail. The impoverished form of their narratives makes it more difficult for them to make sense of their emotional experiences. The narratives of those with ASD tended to be either rambling or skeletal, and it is likely that this interferes with virtually all their social interactions on a daily basis. Interventions should focus on facilitating the ability of those with ASD to tell personal narratives in order to improve their quality of life.