Comprehension of Spatial Demonstratives in Mandarin-speaking Children on the Autism Spectrum: The Roles of Theory of Mind and Executive Function.
Autistic Mandarin-speaking kids misunderstand ‘this/that’ more than language-matched peers—low ToM and working memory are the culprits.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Rong (2024) tested 60 Mandarin-speaking kids. Half had autism, half were typical.
All kids matched on language age. They pointed to toys after hearing ‘this/that’ and ‘here/there’.
The team also gave short ToM and working-memory checks to see what skills drove the pointing.
What they found
Autistic kids got 30 % fewer spatial words right. Gaps stayed even after language was equal.
Better ToM and stronger working memory meant more correct points. Social skill alone did not help.
How this fits with other research
Granader et al. (2014) saw the same triple link in preschoolers: ASD + weak EF + low ToM. Their kids were younger, so the pattern starts early and lasts.
Fisher et al. (2005) tried quick daily drills. ToM training lifted false-belief scores, but EF drills did not budge EF scores. This warns us that working memory may need longer or different work.
Ziermans et al. (2017) tied low verbal working memory to odd, tangled speech in older ASD youth. Together the papers map one root: poor verbal working memory can show up as jumbled talk OR as mix-ups with ‘this/that’.
Why it matters
When a Mandarin-speaking client points to the wrong toy after ‘Put that here’, check two things: Can they hold two places in mind? Do they grasp the speaker’s view? If either score is low, simplify the instruction and pre-teach the spatial words. Use visual cues and give extra think time. These quick tweaks can cut frustration and boost compliance.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
The present study aimed to examine whether Mandarin-speaking children on the autism spectrum showed differences in comprehending spatial demonstratives ("this" and "that", and "here" and "there"), as compared to typically developing (TD) children. Another aim of this study was to investigate the roles of theory of mind (ToM) and executive functions (EF) in the comprehension of spatial demonstratives. Twenty-seven autistic children (mean age 6.86) and 27 receptive-vocabulary-matched TD children (mean age 5.82) were recruited. Demonstrative comprehension was assessed based on participants' ability to place objects in certain locations according to experimenters' instructions which involved these demonstratives in three different conditions (same-, opposite-, and spectator-perspective conditions). Four false-belief tasks were administered to measure ToM, and the word-span task and the dimensional change card sort task were used to measure two subcomponents of EF - working memory and mental flexibility - respectively. Children on the autism spectrum were found to score below TD children in the comprehension of spatial demonstratives. In addition, the results showed that ToM and working memory were conducive to the correct interpretation of spatial demonstratives. The two cognitive abilities mutually influenced their respective roles in spatial demonstrative comprehension in the three different conditions. The findings suggest that the comprehension of spatial demonstratives comprehension is an area of need in Mandarin-speaking children on the autism spectrum, and it might be linked to their differences in cognitive abilities.
Journal of autism and developmental disorders, 2024 · doi:10.1016/S0885-2014(96)90027-1