Establishing metaphorical reasoning in children with autism

Researchers have shown that children with autism have difficulty with non-literal language, such as irony, sarcasm, deception, humor, and metaphors. To date, few studies have attempted to remediate these deficits, and no studies of which we are aware have attempted to teach children with autism to understand metaphors. Metaphorical reasoning consists of complex verbal behavior, involving relations of coordination, hierarchy, and distinction, at a minimum. The purpose of the current study was to evaluate multiple exemplar training for teaching children with autism to attend to relevant features of the context in which a metaphor is used and to engage in the required relational responding in order to respond correctly to metaphorical questions. Participants included three children, ages 5–7. Results suggest that multiple exemplar training is effective for teaching children with autism to understand metaphors. Furthermore, generalization to untrained metaphors was found for all participants.

► Deficits in the ability to understand non-literal language are common in individuals with ASD.
► Metaphors are a ubiquitous form of non-literal language in everyday communication but few or no studies have taught individuals with ASD comprehension of metaphors.
► This study used multiple exemplar training to teach three young children with autism to understand metaphors.
► The procedure was effective for all participants and generalization was found across novel metaphors.
► The results are promising for a behavioral approach to teaching non-literal language comprehension and other forms of cognition to individuals with ASD.