Training Syntax to Enhance Theory of Mind in Children with ASD

Stephanie Durrleman; Anamaria Bentea; Andreea Prisecaru; Evelyne Thommen; Hélène Delage

doi:10.1007/s10803-022-05507-0

Training Syntax to Enhance Theory of Mind in Children with ASD

J Autism Dev Disord. 2023 Jun;53(6):2444-2457. doi: 10.1007/s10803-022-05507-0. Epub 2022 Mar 31.

Authors

Stephanie Durrleman^{1

2

3}, Anamaria Bentea⁴, Andreea Prisecaru⁵, Evelyne Thommen⁶, Hélène Delage⁷

Affiliations

¹ Department of Medicine, Faculty of Science and Medicine, University of Fribourg, Fribourg, Switzerland. stephanie.durrleman@unifr.ch.
² Department of Psycholinguistics and Speech-Language Therapy, Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland. stephanie.durrleman@unifr.ch.
³ Department of Linguistics, Faculty of Humanities, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland. stephanie.durrleman@unifr.ch.
⁴ Department of Linguistics, University of Konstanz, Konstanz, Germany.
⁵ Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience (IOPPN), King's College London, London, UK.
⁶ HETSL, University of Applied Sciences and Arts Western Switzerland, Lausanne, Switzerland.
⁷ Department of Psycholinguistics and Speech-Language Therapy, Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland.

Abstract

Preschool children with neurotypical development (ND) trained on sentential complements ("X thinks/says that") improve their Theory of Mind (ToM) performance. Can complementation training also enhance ToM in children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD)? Thirty-three children with ASD (Mage = 8;11) and 20 younger ND peers (Mage = 4;3) were trained on sentential complements (4-6 weeks, 2-3 times per week, via the DIRE i-Pad App). Pre-training and post-training comparisons show that (1) training boosted both complementation and ToM performance across groups; (2) improvements remained 4-6 weeks after training ended; (3) participants with milder ASD symptoms made most gains. Training on sentential complements thus seems beneficial for addressing ToM difficulties in children with ASD, especially those with milder symptoms.

Keywords: Autism; False belief; Linguistic intervention; Theory of Mind; Training program.

MeSH terms

Autism Spectrum Disorder* / diagnosis
Child, Preschool
Humans
Language
Language Tests
Theory of Mind*

Abstract

MeSH terms

Grants and funding