PMID- 29576384 OWN - NLM STAT- MEDLINE DCOM- 20190610 LR - 20190613 IS - 1873-7994 (Electronic) IS - 0021-9924 (Linking) VI - 73 DP - 2018 May-Jun TI - Assessing social-pragmatic inferencing skills in children with autism spectrum disorder. PG - 91-105 LID - S0021-9924(17)30022-9 [pii] LID - 10.1016/j.jcomdis.2018.01.006 [doi] AB - By utilizing the Pragma test this study investigated how sixteen five- to ten-year-old children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and sixteen typically developing (TD) children comprehended contextually challenging scenarios demanding 1) contextual inference with theory of mind (ToM), 2) contextual inference without ToM, 3) relevant use of language, 4) recognition of feelings, and 5) understanding false beliefs. The study also compared children's ability to explain their own correct answers. In addition, this study evaluated the sensitivity of three different methods for discriminating the children with ASD from the TD children: 1) the Pragma test, 2) the Social Interaction Deviance Composite (SIDC) of Children's Communication Checklist-2 (CCC-2), and 3) the Theory of Mind subtest of the Developmental Neuropsychological Assessment, Second edition (NEPSY-II). The results showed that children with ASD differed from TD children in questions demanding context utilization. However, the demand of mind-reading in utterance interpretation increased the difference between groups. Compared to TD children, children with ASD had more difficulties in explaining how they had used context to arrive at the correct answer. The discrimination power for detecting children with ASD from TD children was excellent in the Pragma test, good in the SIDC CCC-2 and fair in the Theory of Mind subtest of NEPSY-II. This study showed that by using contextually sensitive materials, such as the Pragma test, it is possible to detect the social-pragmatic inferencing difficulties of high-functioning children with ASD in structured test situations and not only in real-life situations or by using parental reports. CI - Copyright (c) 2018 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. FAU - Loukusa, Soile AU - Loukusa S AD - Research Unit of Logopedics, PO Box 1000, 90014 University of Oulu, Finland. Electronic address: soile.loukusa@oulu.fi. FAU - Makinen, Leena AU - Makinen L AD - Research Unit of Logopedics, PO Box 1000, 90014 University of Oulu, Finland. Electronic address: leena.makinen@oulu.fi. FAU - Kuusikko-Gauffin, Sanna AU - Kuusikko-Gauffin S AD - Faculty of Medicine, Institute of Clinical Medicine, Department of Child Psychiatry, Oulu University Hospital, University of Oulu, PO Box. 26, 90029 Oulu, Finland. Electronic address: sanna.kuusikkogauffin@gmail.com. FAU - Ebeling, Hanna AU - Ebeling H AD - Faculty of Medicine, Institute of Clinical Medicine, Department of Child Psychiatry, Oulu University Hospital, University of Oulu, PO Box. 26, 90029 Oulu, Finland. Electronic address: hanna.ebeling@ppshp.fi. FAU - Leinonen, Eeva AU - Leinonen E AD - Office of the Vice Chancellor, Murdoch University, Murdoch, Western Australia 6150, Australia. Electronic address: e.leinonen@murdoch.edu.au. LA - eng PT - Journal Article PT - Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't DEP - 20180202 PL - United States TA - J Commun Disord JT - Journal of communication disorders JID - 0260316 SB - IM MH - Autism Spectrum Disorder/*psychology MH - Child MH - *Child Development MH - Child, Preschool MH - Comprehension MH - Emotions MH - Female MH - Humans MH - *Language MH - Male MH - Neuropsychological Tests MH - *Social Behavior MH - Theory of Mind OTO - NOTNLM OT - Autism spectrum disorder OT - Context OT - Pragmatics OT - Social communication OT - Social-pragmatic inference EDAT- 2018/03/27 06:00 MHDA- 2019/06/14 06:00 CRDT- 2018/03/27 06:00 PHST- 2017/01/31 00:00 [received] PHST- 2017/12/15 00:00 [revised] PHST- 2018/01/22 00:00 [accepted] PHST- 2018/03/27 06:00 [pubmed] PHST- 2019/06/14 06:00 [medline] PHST- 2018/03/27 06:00 [entrez] AID - S0021-9924(17)30022-9 [pii] AID - 10.1016/j.jcomdis.2018.01.006 [doi] PST - ppublish SO - J Commun Disord. 2018 May-Jun;73:91-105. doi: 10.1016/j.jcomdis.2018.01.006. Epub 2018 Feb 2.