Developmental Relations with the Acquisition of Answering Pointing Behavior in Autistic Children

Autism is a neurodevelopmental disorder, characterized by severe impairments in the ability to relate socially and in communication. Many researchers have pointed out that one of the major deficits in autistic children is in the area of communication. Communication deficits are a central symptom of the autism syndrome. Communication problems seem to be intertwined with the social and cognitive difficulties that also characterize the autism syndrome. The acquisition of communication ability is one of the most important practical problems in the education of autistic children. In the previous studies, we examined the developmental problems from the prelinguistic to the linguistic communicative functions of autistic children in relation to their cognitive development. Their communicative skills became more complex with the progress of their cognitive development, but they had still difficulties in the prelmguistic communicative abilities. Pointing behavior is the most typical prelinguistic communicative functions. In the present research, we attempted to analyze the problems of the developmental relations with the acquisition of pointing behavior in autistic children. In the communicative functions of pointing behavior, we directed our attention to the answering pointing behavior. Subjects were 20 autistic children enrolled in our class of remedial education for handicapped children. The 20 autistic children had been diagnosed according to currently used criteria (DSM-III-R, 1987). Their present chronological ages ranged from 3 years 9 months to 18 years 4 months. In this study, we estimated the acquisition of answering pointing behavior when subject passed both "pointing the drawing objects" and "pointing the parts of face on the items of Kyoto Scale of Psychological Development. This study was attempted, first, to compare the percentages of passing between before the acquisition and after the acquisition of answering pointing behavior for the items abovementioned developmental scale, and second, to analyze the developmental prognosis with the period of acquisition of answering pointing behavior (before or after 5 years old). Furthermore, we examined the case study attempting to clarify the developmental process of the acquisition of answering pointing. The results indicated that the number of children who pass the some items of the developmental scale increase, and the interpersonal relationships changes remarkably with the acquisition of answering pointing behavior, On the basis of these results, we discussed the developmental meaning on the acquisition of answering pointing behavior in autistic children from the viewpoint of the developmental relations. Finally, the possibility that impaired pointing behavior may be a precursor to autistic children's impaired "theory of mind" (the ability to understand other people's mental states) is discussed