Oral story retelling after reading or listening: children with ASD versus typical development. A pilot study

Abstract

Oral retelling portrays what one understands from reading or listening to a text. The retold stories of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) often show macrostructural (overall story structure) difficulties. The study’s purpose was to compare macrostructure oral story retelling, after reading (visual modality) or listening (auditory modality) to a story, among 20 children with ASD versus 20 children with typical development and to examine correlations with theory of mind (ToM). The study measures included story retelling and second-order ToM. The ASD group exhibited difficulties in one essential macrostructure aspect. No differences emerged between modalities for both groups. ToM correlated positively with macrostructure measures in both groups. False belief significantly correlated with the ability to retell essential characteristics in the visual modality for ASD. Implications are discussed.

Keywords:

• Autism spectrum disorder
• macrostructure
• modality
• story retelling

Disclosure statement

The authors have no potential competing interest to report.

Notes

1 The matching process was performed by the second author

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Yael Kimhi

Dr. Yael Kimhi is a senior lecturer and the Acting Rector of the Levinsky-Wingate Academic College (formerly the Levinsky College of Education). Her research focuses on the academic and cognitive development in the autism spectrum (ASD), teacher education, and the connections between theoretical knowledge and best practice concerning diverse populations (ASD, giftedness, inclusive education). Prior to her academic positions, she was a special education inspector at the Israeli Ministry of Education.

Liat Kadosh

Liat Kadosh is a speech-language pathologist and an expert in the field of ASD. She completed her M.A. in special education with honors. She is a special education counselor for speech-language pathologists and special education staff members.

Gila Tubul-Lavy

Dr. Gila Tubul-Lavy is a speech-language pathologist and a senior lecturer in the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders at the Ono Academic College. Her research focuses on language development, language disorders, and their academic implications. She was a special education instructor for speech-language pathologists and special education staff members at the Israeli Ministry of Education.