Brief Report: Testing the Impairment of Initiation Processes Hypothesis in Autism Spectrum Disorder

In the present study we aim at providing further evidences for the validity of an initiation processes impairment in autism spectrum disorder (ASD). We applied different verbal fluency tasks designed to decrease or enhance this limitation. A group of high-functioning individuals with ASD and a group of typically developed individuals matched for -age, -IQ and -education, were tested in three verbal fluency tasks. In task 1, we replicated previous findings of an initiation impairment. In tasks 2 and 3, with simple manipulations, we observed that the differences between the groups were respectively eliminated or enhanced. We have not only provided further evidence of impairments in the initiation of a response, but we remarkably show how to circumvent them.