Expressive and Receptive Prosody in Autism

描述(由申请人提供)：自闭症谱系障碍(ASD)形成一组神经精神疾病，其核心行为特征包括相互社交、交流中的障碍，以及重复、刻板印象或受限的兴趣和行为。韵律缺陷在自闭症患者的适应性交际能力中的重要性以及对这些障碍的核心社会残疾的更充分的理解的重要性已经得到普遍认可；然而，目前的研究在数量上很少，而且在方法上有很大的局限性。拟议项目的目标是通过一系列实验详细说明患有自闭症的年轻说话者的韵律缺陷，以解决这些残疾和相关的功能领域。该项目的主要特点包括：1)创新技术的应用。这项研究将应用基于计算机的语音和语言技术来量化表达韵律，计算对话结构，并产生用于测量接受性韵律的声控语音刺激；此外，所有实验将通过计算机进行，以确保刺激的一致性和记录反应的准确性；2)韵律维度的广泛覆盖。韵律的所有三个功能，语法、语用和情感，都将被讨论；表达和接受任务将被包括在内；并且将使用语境任务(对话、故事理解和记忆)和去语境任务(例如，声音情感识别)；3)包括神经心理学评估和分类方法，以解决组内的异质性，并获得组的详细特征；4)包括两个对照组：典型发育儿童和发展性语言障碍儿童；5)包括一个实验性的治疗计划，以提高自闭症患者的韵律能力。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Autistic Spectrum Disorders (ASD) form a group of neuropsychiatric conditions whose core behavioral features include impairments in reciprocal social interaction, in communication, and repetitive, stereotyped, or restricted interests and behaviors. The importance of prosodic deficits in the adaptive communicative competence of speakers with ASD, as well as for a fuller understanding of the social disabilities central to these disorders is generally recognized; yet current studies are few in number and have significant methodological limitations. The objective of the proposed project is to detail prosodic deficits in young speakers with ASD through a series of experiments that address these disabilities and related areas of function. Key features of the project include: 1) the application of innovative technology. The study will apply computer-based speech and language technologies for quantifying expressive prosody, for computing dialogue structure, and for generating acoustically controlled speech stimuli for measuring receptive prosody; moreover, all experiments will be delivered via computer to insure consistency of stimuli and accuracy of recording responses; 2) broad coverage of the dimensions of prosody. All three functions of prosody, grammatical, pragmatic, and affective, will be addressed; expressive and receptive tasks are included; and both contextualized tasks (dialogue, story comprehension and memory) and decontextualized tasks (e.g., vocal affect recognition) will be used; 3) inclusion of neuropsychological assessment and classification methodologies to address within-group heterogeneity and obtain a detailed characterization of the groups; 4) inclusion of two comparison groups: children with typical development and those with Developmental Language Disorder; 5) inclusion of an experimental treatment program to enhance the prosodic abilities of speakers with ASD.