Examination of script and non-script based narrative retellings in children with autism spectrum disorders

• Narratives of children with ASD were reduced in macro and microstructure.
• Both story types were challenging for children with ASD.
• ToM was a significant predictor of narrative ability for children with ASD.
• Findings have implications for narrative interventions for children with ASD.

BackgroundNarrative production is challenging for children with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD), particularly in terms of creating coherent and cohesive stories. However, differences between the narratives of children with and without ASD may be attenuated when cognitive and linguistic demands are reduced. Therefore, the present study examined whether incorporating a script-framework, that structures the story around common events, reduced children's difficulties with narratives.MethodThis study compared the narrative abilities of children with ASD (N = 19) and neurotypical (NT; N = 26) children on a script-based and a non-script based retelling task. Narratives were coded for microstructure, macrostructure, and type of script-based story events (script, non-script). The relation between narrative and theory of mind (ToM) was also assessed.ResultsIn comparison to their NT peers, children with ASD exhibited lower narrative production in terms of microstructure and macrostructure on both script and non-script based stories. In general, the narratives by children with ASD were less cohesive and coherent than the NT group. ToM ability and FSIQ predicted narrative coherence and cohesion in children with ASD. Moreover, examination of the script-based story revealed that children with ASD included the same number of script details as the NT children, but were less likely to include non-script details.ConclusionsThese findings provide evidence that narrative impairments may be present across narrative type, and that ToM ability in particular, predicts these difficulties in children with ASD. These findings have implications for common event understanding and highlight the need for early narrative intervention for children with ASD.