Autism and Speech
Autistic individuals struggle with social interaction, which leads to poor communication. Autistic individuals may have very poor language skills and may not talk at all. The is because pre-linguistic skills maybe disrupted in autistic individuals.
What are pre-linguistic skills?
Before a child can learn to speak, the child learns several social cues such as:
-Eye-contact
-Joint-attention
-Social response
-Gestures
-Vocalizations
-Imitation
-Turn taking, etc.
Pre-linguistic skills form the foundation for speech and language learning. There are distinct pre-liguistic milestones through a child’s development, which is necessary for speech development.
Children with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) tend to struggle with learning pre-linguistic skills. This in turn affects their ability to speak. Thus, language disorders are a significant feature of ASD individuals.
Issues with pre-linguistic difficulties
-Lack of comprehension of language
-Use of expressive language
-Behavioural issues such as temper tantrums
-Lack of attention
-Poor social skills
On the other hand, some individuals with ASD can be quite good with speech, especially when they have to communicate topics of interest, leading to rich vocabularies. They may still face issues with language.
Speech language pathologists therefore play a very important role in mainstreaming autistic children. A speech language pathologist provides therapy that helps an autistic child to manage problems related to speech, language and even other oral difficulties such as swallowing.