Gaining Insights into Atypical Pragmatic Development in Young Children;Autism Spectrum Disorder in Focus

Pragmatic skills are one of the most difficult aspect of language ability to assess and quantify (Young et al. 2005) and cannot be studied in decontextualized social settings. Children’s pragmatic development in their first language is characterized by the emergence of speech acts and conversational skills, awareness of social parameters of language, and the acquisition of extended discourse genres. This study takes a full account of these aspects in order to shed lights on the atypical pragmatic development in children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). The study then proceeds to describe socio-pragmatic dysfunctions among ASD children, points out the similarities between ASD and Language Impairment, and finally outlines the widely-used methods of assessing pragmatics among children with ASD.

Keywords:

pragmatic acquisition , autism spectrum disorder , language impairment , assessment , young children