10/2 Topics in ASD: Communication Assessment Flashcards
What is the communication assessment purpose?
- Critical part of overall assessment –> communication deficits are main area of challenge.
- 1) Evaluate current social skill functioning and/or social competence
- 2) Identify skills that will be targeted for intervention
- 3) Identify strengths
What are the two procedures that are used for communication assessment?
- Direct & Indirect methods
What is a Direct Assessment Type?
An analysis of student’s behaviors on whether target skill sets have been mastered and/or achieved
What is an Indirect Assessment Type?
An analysis of reported perceptions about the student’s mastery of specific skill sets.
Perceptions can consist of teacher/parent reports. self-reports by the student and can be made by different faculty & staff
What are some things we want to look at in regards to language during the communication assessment?
- Formal aspects of language (Receptive & Expressive)
- Atypical features of language (Pronoun reversals, scripted language, echolalia; prosody, inflection, volume, register)
- Nonverbal forms of communication (Eye contact, gestures)
- Language use for social purposes
Assessment at the prelinguistic stage should focus on what areas? ( These areas are also how we get our differential diagnosis)
- Depressed rate of preverbal communicative acts
- Delayed development of pointing gestures
- Use of nonconventional means of communicating
- Reduced responsiveness to speech and to hearing their name called.
- Restricted range of communicative behaviors
- Atypical preverbal vocalizations
- Deficits in play
- Limited ability to imitate
What setting should we observe the child in?
In more naturalistic interactions
What instruments/measures are used during the assessment in prelinguistic stage?
- Communication and symbolic behavior scale (CSBS)
- Early scale of communication and socialization
- Communication intention inventory
- Prelinguistic communication assessment
All the measures used during the prelinguistic stage of assessment tend to use what?
- “Communicative temptations” to elicit target behaviors and compare rate of communicative acts to norms
What are the components of the CSBS (2002)?
- Norm-referenced
- Infant-toddler checklist
- Caregiver questionnaire
- Behavior sample (videotaped)
- Caregiver perception rating
- Measures change over time
There has to be three components that need to be present for a communicative act to occur, what are they?
- Gesture, vocalization or verbal production
- It has to be directed towards another person (gaze, touch, etc.)
- Interpretable as a message (request, protest, etc.) –> Has to have a function
The functions of communication below 18 months of age the main functions are…
- Regulatory:
- Comments: Calling attentions to objects or activities in the purpose of joint attention.
- Social interaction
The discourse functions expand for 18 to 24 months of age are…
- Requests for information
- Acknowledgements and answers
What are some means of communication? (how they communicate)
- Eye gaze
- Babbling
- Gestures (pointing between 6-10mos)
- Use of nonconventional gestures
- Atypical preverbal vocalizations
- Evaluated concurrently with function & frequency
What is their responsiveness to communication?
- Respond to name by 12 months
- 12 months = 50 word receptive vocabulary
- ASD = Reduced responsiveness to speech
- Observation of caregiver-child play
What should you do if child/adult does not have verbal speech?
Analyze strengths and needs
What are some techniques used in older children for communicative assessment?
- Is child/adult doesn’t have verbal speech then analyze strengths and needs
- Introduce AAC
- Interact with other, have control over environment
- Unaided vs. Aided
- Complete a needs assessment to determine what the appropriate tool to use
What are some criterion-referenced measures to us in nonverbal older children?
- Augmentative communication assessment profile
- Developmental assessment for individuals with severe disabilities
- Checklists to determine means and functions of communication
During a spoken language assessment what are some standardized instruments?
- CELF-P-2 (syntax, semantics, morphology, literacy, concepts, pragmatic profiles)
- PPVT (receptive and expressive vocabulary
- MacArthur-Bates CDI (Play, gestures, syntax, vocabulary)
- PLS-5 (receptive.expressive syntax, semantics, morphology)
- TOLD-P (Vocabulary, syntax, morphology, phonology)
What do we obtain from a spontaneous speech sample?
- Primary means of establishing a communication profile
- Play, caregiver routine, shared book reading
What is a good elicitation procedure to use to obtain a spontaneous speech?
Temptations (play with toys and keep it to yourself)
What type of communication behaviors do we look at in ASD?
- Responsiveness to communication
- Analyze: name response, response to adult’s speech
- Echolalia
- Proportion of echoed to spontaneous utterances, immediate or delayed - Pronoun use
- Analyze: # of inappropriate uses vs total - Vocabulary and syntax
- Type-Token Ratio, MLU
What are some things to look for during Pragmatic Assessment?
- Communicative functions = purpose
- Assess range (directing, even reporting, reasoning, predicting, empathizing, imagining, negotiating)
- Discourse management = organization
- Assess turns, topic preservation, maintenance and switching, transition phrases - Register variation = flexible use of language forms
- Assess use of polite forms, ability to change forms - Presupposition = knowledge assumption
- Give appropriate information, use pronouns, use ellipsis, create central flow of conversation - Conversational manner = contributions
- Fluid speech that is not overly complex or blatantly sparse &/or disorganized - Assessment form example
What are some standardized measures for assessment with high functioning ASD?
- TOPL-2 (Test of pragmatic language)
- CASL (Comprehensive assessment of spoken language)
- TLC (Test of language competence)
- PRS (Pragmatic rating scale)
How do we assess pragmatics and prosody in children with high functioning ASD?
- Assess through tropics of discussion
Things to assess while looking at pragmatics and prosody in children with high functioning ASD is…
- TOM
- Empathy, emotion expression
- Obsessive interests
- Blunt comments
- Overly friendly
- Questioning
- Understanding of irony, humor
What are some things to look at in regards to narrative skills?
- Social difficulties hinder ability to create cohesive stories
- Inferences, internal responses of character
- Higher level language abilities
- TNL (Test of Narrative Language)
What are things to note during intervention planning?
- Identify frequency, range, and means of communicative acts expressed
- Degree of responsiveness to communication
- Describe language acquisition (delayed, absent, SLI, strength)
- Compare language use with pragmatic abilities
- Identify language patterns associated with ASD
- Accessible form of AAC (Non-verbal)
- Set goals fro the child’s communication intervention program
- Strengths and needs assessment
- Dynamic assessment
