The co-development of speech and gesture in children with autism
from Clinical Linguistics and Phonetics
Recent interest in gesture has led to an understanding of the development of gesture and speech in typically developing young children. Research suggests that initially gesture and speech form two independent systems which combine together temporally and semantically before children enter the two-word period of language development. However, little is known about gesture development in children’s disordered speech. This paper presents two case studies of young children with autism. The children are under 3 years of age and attend an intervention programme to facilitate their social and communication development. Early indications suggest that whilst both gesture and speech development is delayed in children with Autistic Spectrum Disorders (ASD), the developmental trajectory is the same as for typically developing children.
No comments yet.
Leave a comment
About the Callier Library

Callier Library is a satellite facility of The University of Texas at Dallas, McDermott Library. It is located at the Dallas, Texas campus of the Callier Center for Communication Disorders. The library supports the graduate-level programs and faculty in communications sciences which are located at the center. It also supports the work of clinicians in hearing and speech disorders who work at both campuses of the Callier Center. One of the missions of Callier Library is to be a useful source of information to the international community of researchers and clinicians in communication disorders. To that end, this web log of citations and news in the field has been built and maintained by Allen Clayton, the Callier Center Librarian.
Note: These news items are gleaned from over 400 sources on the Internet and are provided as a service to our patrons. The University of Texas at Dallas does not guarantee the veracity, reliability or completeness of any information provided on this page, or in any hyperlink appearing on this page