Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Pauses in the narratives produced by autistic, mentally retarded, and normal children as an index of cognitive demand

  • Published:
Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

This study investigated the production of different types of speech pauses and repairs in the story narratives produced by autistic, mentally retarded, and normal children, matched on verbal mental age. Ten children in each group were asked to tell the story depicted in a wordless picture book. The narratives were analyzed for frequency of grammatical (between phrase) and nongrammatical (within phrase) pauses, and for several measures of story length and complexity. The main results were that children with autism produced significantly fewer nongrammatical pauses, and that their nongrammatical pausing was correlated with measures of story length and complexity. These findings suggest that the stories told by the autistic children reflect reduced cognitive and communicative demand. The implications of this study for future research on the use of a variety of prosodic characteristics as measures of social cognitive deficit in autism are discussed.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Baltaxe, C. (1977). Pragmatic deficits in the language of autistic children.Journal of Pediatric Psychology, 2, 176–180.

    Google Scholar 

  • Baltaxe, C. (1981). Acoustic characteristics of prosody in autism. International Congress for the Scientific Study of Mental Deficiency. In P. Mittler (Ed.),New frontiers of knowledge in the scientific study of mental deficiency (pp. 223–233). Baltimore, MD: University Park.

    Google Scholar 

  • Baltaxe, C., & Simmons, J. Q. (1977). Bedtime soliloquies and linguistic competence in autism.Journal of Speech and Hearing Disorders, 42, 376–393.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Baltaxe, C., & Simmons, J. Q. (1985). Prosodic development in normal and autistic children. In E. Schopler & G. B. Mesibov (Eds.),Communication problems in autism (pp. 95–125). New York: Plenum Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Baron-Cohen, S. (1988). Social and pragmatic deficits in autism: Cognitive or affective?Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 18, 379–402.

    Google Scholar 

  • Baron-Cohen, S., Leslie, A. M., & Frith, U. (1986). Mechanical, behavioral, and intentional understanding of picture stories in autistic children.British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 4, 113–125.

    Google Scholar 

  • Beattie, G. W., & Bradbury, R. J. (1979). An experimental investigation of the modifiability of the temporal structure of spontaneous speech.Journal of Psycholinguistic Research, 8, 225–248.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Brotherton, P. (1979). Speaking and not speaking: Processes for translating ideas into speech. In A. W. Siegman & S. Feldstein, (Eds.),Of speech and time: Temporal speech patterns in interpersonal contexis (pp. 179–210). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.

    Google Scholar 

  • Butcher, A. (1981). Aspects of the speech pause: Phonetic correlates and communicative functions.Arbeitsberichte, 15, 1–233.

    Google Scholar 

  • Chafe, W. (1985). Some reasons for hesitating. In D. Tannen & Saville-Troike (Eds.),Perspectives on silence (pp. 77–89), Hillsdale, NJ: Ablex.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cohen, D. J., Paul, R., & Volkmar, F. R. (1987). Issues in the classification of pervasive developmental disorders and associated conditions. In D. J. Cohen & A. M. Donnellan (Eds.),Handbook of autism and pervasive developmental disorders (pp. 20–40). New York: Wiley.

    Google Scholar 

  • Denckla, M. B. (1986). New diagnostic criteria for autism and related behavioral disorders —guidelines for research protocols.Journal of the American Academy of Child Psychiatry, 25, 221–224.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Dunn, L., & Dunn, L. (1981).The Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test—Revised: Manual, Circle Pines, MN: American Guidance Service.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fay, W. H. (1969). On the basis of autistic echolalia.Journal of Communication Disorders, 2, 38–47.

    Google Scholar 

  • Feldstein, S., Konstantareas, M., Oxman, J., & Webster, C. D. (1982). The chronography of interactions with autistic speakers: An initial report.Journal of Communication Disorders, 15, 451–460.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Fine, J., Bartolucci, G., Ginsberg, G., & Szatmari. (1991). The use of intonation to communicate in pervasive developmental disorders.Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 32, 771–782.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Goldfarb, W., Braunstein, P. & Lorge, I. (1956). A study of speech patterns in a group of schizophrenic children.American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 26, 544–555.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Goldfarb, W., Goldfarb, N., Braunstein, P., & Scholl, H. (1972). Speech and language faults in a group of schizophrenic children.Journal of Autism and Childhood Schizophrenia, 2, 219–233.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Goldman-Eisler, F. (1961). A comparative study of two hesitation phenomena.Language and Speech, 4, 18–26.

    Google Scholar 

  • Goldman-Eisler, F. (1968).Psycholinguistics: Experiments in spontaneous speech. London: Academic Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Goldman-Eisler, F. (1972). Pauses, clauses, and sentences.Language and Speech, 15, 103–113.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Goodman, C. (1981).Conversational organization. New York: Academic Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Greene, J. O., & Lindsey, A. E. (1989). Encoding processes in the production of multiple-goal messages.Human Communication Research, 16, 120–140.

    Google Scholar 

  • Greene, J. O., Lindsey, A. E. & Hawn, J. J. (1990). Social goals and speech production: Effects of multiple goals on pausal phenomena.Journal of Language and Social Psychology, 9, 119–134.

    Google Scholar 

  • Holmes, V. M. (1984). Sentence planning in a story continuation task.Language and Speech, 27, 115–134.

    Google Scholar 

  • Huddleston, R. (1988).English grammar: An outline, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kanner, L. (1943). Autistic disturbances of affective contact.Nervous Child, 2, 217–250.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kanner, L. (1946). Irrelevant and metaphorical language in early infantile autism.American Journal of Psychiatry, 103, 242–246.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kowal, S., O'Connell, D. C., & Sabin, E. J. (1975). Development of temporal patterning and vocal hesitations in spontaneous narratives.Journal of Psycholinguistic Research, 4, 195–207.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kowal, S., O'Connell, D. C., O'Brien, E. A., & Bryant, E. T. (1975). Temporal aspects of reading aloud and speaking: Three experiments.American Journal of Psychology, 88, 549–569.

    Google Scholar 

  • Leeper, H. A., & Woodward, R. E. (1978). Temporal characteristics of topic- and pictureelicited speech of children.Perceptual and Motor Skills, 47, 496–498.

    Google Scholar 

  • Levelt, W. J. M., & Ford, B. L. (1967). Hesitations in children's speech during explanation and description.Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 6, 560–564.

    Google Scholar 

  • Loveland, K. A., McEvoy, R. E., Kelley, M. L. & Tunali, B. (1990). Narrative story telling in autism and Down's syndrome.British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 8, 9–23.

    Google Scholar 

  • Loveland, K. A., & Tunali, B. (1993). Narrative Janguage in autism and the theory of mind hypothesis: A wider perspective. In S. Baron-Cohen, H. Tager-Flusberg, & D. Cohen (Eds.),Understanding other minds: Perspectives on the theory of mind hypothesis in autism. (pp. 247–266). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Maclay, H. & Osgood, C. E. (1959). Hesitation phenomena in spontaneous English speech.Word, 15, 19–44.

    Google Scholar 

  • Markel, N. (1990). Speaking style as an expression of solidarity: Words per pause.Language in Society, 19, 81–88.

    Google Scholar 

  • Martin, J. G. (1967). Hesitations in the speaker's production and the listener's reproduction of utterances.Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 6, 903–909.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mayer, M. (1969).Frog, where are you? New York: Dial.

    Google Scholar 

  • Nagata, H. (1982). The correlation between word order and the position of syntactic markers: time course analysis of sentence production.Japanese Psychological Research, 24, 216–221.

    Google Scholar 

  • Naremore, R. C., & Dever, R. B. (1975). Language performance of educable mentally retarded and normal children at five age levels.Journal of Speech and Hearing Research. 18, 82–95.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Paul, R. (1987). Communication. In D. J. Cohen & A. M. Donnellan (Eds.),Handbook of autism and pervasive developmental disorders (pp. 61–84) New York: Wiley.

    Google Scholar 

  • Prizant, B. M. (1983). Echolalia in autism: Assessment and intervention.Seminars in Speech and Language, 4, 63–77.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pronovost, W., Wakstein, M., & Wakstein, P. (1966). A longitudinal study of the speech behavior and language comprehension of fourteen children diagnosed atypical or autistic.Exceptional Children, 33, 19–26.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Radford, A. (1981).Transformational syntax, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Reynolds, A., & Paivio, A. (1968). Cognitive and emotional determinants of speech.Canadian Journal of Psychology, 22, 164–175.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Resnick, H., & Oltmanns, T. (1984). Hesitation patterns in the speech of thought-disordered schizophrenic and manic patients.Journal of Abnormal Psychology. 93, 80–86.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Rudor, K. F., & Jensen, P. J. (1972). Fluent and hesitation pauses as a function of syntactic complexity.Journal of Speech and Hearing Research. 15, 49–60.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Scarborough, H. S. (1990). Index of productive syntax.Applied Psycholinguistics, 11, 1–22.

    Google Scholar 

  • Schachter, S., Christenfeld, N., Ravina, B., & Bilous, F. (1991). Speech disfluency and the structure of knowledge.Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 60, 362–367.

    Google Scholar 

  • Szawara, J., & O'Connell, D. C. (1977). Temporal reflections of spontaneity in homilies.Bulletin of the Psychonomic Society, 9, 360–362.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tager-Flusberg, H. (1981). On the nature of linguistic functioning in early infantile autism.Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 11, 45–56.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Tager-Flusberg, H. (1989). A psycholinguistic perspective on language development in the autistic child. In G. Dawson (Ed.),Autism: Nature, diagnosis, and treatment (pp. 92–115). New York: Guilford.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tager-Flusberg, H. (1991).Narrative discourse and mental state understanding in autistic subjects. Paper presented at the British Psychological Society Developmental Conference, Cambridge, England.

  • Thurber, C. A. (1991).The effects of non-grammatical silent in-turn speech pauses on the comprehension of discourse. Unpublished undergraduate honors thesis. Harvard University, Cambridg, MA.

    Google Scholar 

  • Van Lackner, D., Cornelius, C., & Kreiman, J. (1989). Recognition of emotional-prosodic meanings in speech by autistic, schizophrenic, and normal children.Developmental Neuropsychology, 5, 207–226.

    Google Scholar 

  • Volkmar, F. R., Hoder, E. L. & Cohen, D. J. (1985). Compliance, “negativism”, and the effects of treatment and structure in autism: A naturalistic behavior study.Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 26, 865–877.

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, University of Massachusetts, 100 Morrissey Boulevard, 02125-3393, Boston, Massachusetts

    Christopher Thurber & Helen Tager-Flusberg

Authors
  1. Christopher Thurber
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Helen Tager-Flusberg
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Additional information

This research was supported by a grant from the National Institute of Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (1R01 DC 01234) to the second author. We thank Lowry Hemphill, Nancy Picardi, Ann Chadwick-Dias, and Kathleen Quill for their help in collecting and transcribing the data, and Lawrence Pick for his assistance with the coding. We are also very grateful to schools where the study was conducted, especially the League School of Boston.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Thurber, C., Tager-Flusberg, H. Pauses in the narratives produced by autistic, mentally retarded, and normal children as an index of cognitive demand. J Autism Dev Disord 23, 309–322 (1993). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01046222

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01046222

Keywords

Search

Navigation