Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, 94305, USA.
Department of Hearing and Speech Sciences, Vanderbilt School of Medicine, Nashville, TN, 37205, USA.
J Autism Dev Disord. 2020 Aug;50(8):2957-2972. doi: 10.1007/s10803-020-04402-w.
This systematic review examined definitions of "nonverbal" or "minimally verbal" and assessment measures used to evaluate communication in intervention studies focusing on improving expressive verbal communication in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). We reviewed sample size, number of participants, participant age, and male/female representation. Our analysis yielded relatively few studies with non/minimally verbal children with ASD focusing on verbal expressive communication. Further, we found large inconsistencies in measures used, definitions of "nonverbal" and "minimally verbal", and ages targeted. Guidelines are suggested to create a more uniform assessment protocol with systematic descriptions of early communication learners as a foundational step for understanding the heterogeneity in this group and replicating research findings for this subgroup of children with ASD.
本系统综述考察了“非言语”或“最小言语”的定义以及用于评估干预研究中沟通的评估工具，这些研究重点是提高自闭症谱系障碍（ASD）儿童的表达性言语沟通。我们回顾了样本量、参与者人数、参与者年龄以及男女比例。我们的分析结果显示，针对具有 ASD 的非/最小言语儿童、关注言语表达沟通的研究相对较少。此外，我们发现所使用的测量方法、“非言语”和“最小言语”的定义以及目标年龄存在很大差异。建议制定更统一的评估方案，对早期沟通学习者进行系统描述，作为理解该组异质性和复制该亚组 ASD 儿童研究结果的基础步骤。
