Selective Pragmatic Impairment in Autism Spectrum Disorder: Indirect Requests Versus Irony.

Deliens et al. (2018) tested the adults with high-functioning autism and 24 typical adults. Each person listened to short stories that ended with either an indirect request or ironic remark.

After every story the adult answered: 'What did the speaker really mean?' The team then compared right and wrong answers between the two groups.

Both groups scored about the same on indirect requests like 'It's cold in here' meaning 'Close the window.'

But the autism group got far fewer irony items right, such as 'Great weather' said during a storm. Pragmatic skill was not all-or-nothing; it was task-specific.

Capio et al. (2013) saw the same split pattern with vicarious embarrassment. Adults with ASD felt normal embarrassment when someone spilled coffee by accident, yet less embarrassment when the mishap was done on purpose. Both studies show mentalizing tasks trip up ASD adults, while simple social cues do not.

Sherwell et al. (2014) also found selective trouble. Their ASD adults could not work backward from a fake happy face to guess what gift had been given, even though they looked at the eyes just as much. Together the papers warn that good eye contact does not guarantee full social understanding.

Sturmey et al. (2010) looked at younger children and found receptive gaps with words like 'this' or head nods. Across ages and tasks, pragmatic problems in ASD are spotty, not global.

Stop assuming a client who follows 'Please sit' will also grasp sarcastic 'Nice job.' Test each pragmatic type on its own. If you see success with egocentric requests, move to explicit mental-state training for irony, fake emotions, and hidden intentions. Write separate goals for literal and non-literal language so your lesson plans match the real, uneven profile.