Qualitative analysis of verbal fluency in school-age children with high-functioning autism spectrum disorders. Associations with age and IQ.

Researchers compared language skills in 20 children with high-functioning autism to 20 children without autism using word-naming tasks. Children with autism found it harder to quickly name words when given categories (like 'animals') or letters (like words starting with 'F'). The study suggests children with autism have slower word retrieval from memory rather than problems understanding word meanings. Older children with autism performed better, but those with more severe autism symptoms or ADHD-like behaviors made more mistakes.

This study examined verbal fluency performance in 20 school-age children with high-functioning autism spectrum disorder (HF-ASD) compared to 20 neurotypical controls. Children with HF-ASD generated significantly fewer correct responses on both semantic and letter-based verbal fluency tasks. Both groups performed better on semantic tasks than letter tasks, but showed no differences in clustering, switching, or error patterns. In the ASD group, age correlated with better performance, while autism severity and ADHD symptoms correlated with more errors.

The findings support the Slow-Retrieval Model, suggesting children with HF-ASD have difficulty with word retrieval speed rather than lexical-semantic structure problems.

Findings suggest speech-language interventions for autistic children should target retrieval speed and processing efficiency rather than vocabulary building alone. Age-related improvements indicate continued development of language skills. Consideration of ADHD symptoms may be important for comprehensive language assessment and intervention planning.

Small sample size (n=20 per group) limits generalizability. Study focuses only on high-functioning autism, excluding broader spectrum representation. Cross-sectional design prevents causal inferences. Limited demographic details provided about participants.

This study analyzes performance on both a Semantic and a Letter verbal fluency (VF) task in school-age children with high-functioning autism spectrum disorder (HF-ASD) (n = 20) and without ASD (n = 20) and investigates the relationship between VF indicators and age, verbal and non-verbal IQ, ASD severity, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) symptomatology. Furthermore, the Poor Lexical-Semantic Structure Model and the Slow-Retrieval Model are tested if they could account for semantic retrieval difficulties in children with HF-ASD. The HF-ASD group generated significantly fewer correct responses in both VF tasks in comparison to the control group. The type of task significantly affected performance and both groups showed higher word generativity on the Semantic task.

The groups did not differ in clustering, switching, and errors. Age significantly correlated with the VF indicators in the ASD group, but in the control group, there was a significant negative correlation with the number of errors. Non-verbal and verbal IQ did not correlate with any VF indicators in both groups, while ASD severity and ADHD symptomatology correlated positively and significantly with error responses in the ASD group. The Slow-Retrieval Model explains VF difficulties in the HF-ASD group indicating that poorer word generativity can be attributed to slower retrieval of words from the semantic network.