Attentional orienting in young children with autism spectrum disorders

• Main Authors: Yen-Ting Yu, 虞燕婷
• Other Authors: Chung-Hsin CHIANG
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2008
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/68672585841248963185

碩士 === 國立中正大學 === 臨床心理學研究所 === 96 === The purpose of this study was to investigate the social orienting, and joint attention in young children with autism spectrum disorders. The participants were eighteen 30-month-olds (range = 25-35 months) young children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD), 18 28-month-olds (range = 25-36 months) young children with developmental delay (DD), and 21 17-month-olds (range = 14-20 months) toddlers with typical development (TD). This materials used in the study referred from Dawson et al., (1998, 2004), six social stimuli and six non social stimuli appeared at child’s left or right sides randomly from two speakers when the child sat on the chair. Social stimuli included three types of emotional tone (happy, anger and neutral) and three kinds of two-words for command. Non social stimuli included three types of rhythm of hammer knocking and three types of electronic music. It was found that, compared to young children with DD and TD, young children with ASD performed impairment than young children with DD in orienting behaviors. Moreover, for young children with ASD, correlation analyses revealed that a significant relation between social orienting ability and responding joint attention, but not between social orienting ability and initiating joint attention. For both control groups, there was no significant relationship among social orienting ability and responding joint attention or initiating joint attention. The results suggested that social orienting impairment in children with ASD manifest under ages of three and the social orienting ability seemed more related to responding joint attention in the ASD population. Key world: autism; attentional orienting; social orienting; joint attentional skills