1,720,965 research outputs found
Coping with the metaphorical meaning of words: a treatment with a child with Autism Spectrum Disorder
No full textThe authors analyze the case of a child (9. 8), conventionally called Lorenzo, with Autism Spectrum Disorder without intellectual disability and adequate basic language abilities, in spite of some weaknesses in figurative language, metaphors in particular. The child showed a marked tendency towards verbal hypercategorization. This study describes Lorenzo's improvement in metaphor comprehension after a specific treatment. Metaphor comprehension was assessed before and after the treatment with two tests, one based on sensory metaphors for children 4-6 and the other, on physical-psychological metaphors, for children 9-14. The child's performance was compared to typically developing (TD) children. At pre-test, there was a significant gap between Lorenzo's and the TDs' performance at both tests. At post-test, the child completely caught up the difference in sensory metaphors, and remarkably improved in physical-psychological metaphors. The discussion focuses on Lorenzo's capability to exploit his tendency towards hypercategorization in order to better analyze the semantic features of metaphors
Improving the ability to write persuasive texts in a boy with autism spectrum disorder: outcomes of an intervention
Get PDFIn this paper, we describe an intervention implemented to assist a 13.2-year-old boy with Autism Spectrum Disorder, G, without intellectual disability, aimed at improving his ability to compose persuasive texts. There was an initial assessment (baseline), an intermediate assessment after two weeks, a six-session intervention phase, and a post-intervention assessment. Our intervention applied two procedures. The first aimed at enhancing general composition abilities in terms of picking (P) ideas, organizing (O) notes, and writing (W) them down (POW), while the second specified the steps to write a persuasive text addressing a possible reader: a topic sentence (T), reasons (R), an explanation (E) for the reasons and the end of the sentence (E) (TREE). These procedures were termed POW + TREE. To analyze G’s texts, three types of measures were used by two raters at baseline, intermediate and post-test time: a) the presence of the TREE components; b) the quality of the reasons and explanations for the reasons; c) the number of mental state terms. All these measures showed relevant quantitative improvements, as well as qualitative changes. In addition, when G’s performance at the end of the intervention was compared to that of typically developing controls, no statistical difference appeared. The results are discussed in light of the potentialities offered by the type of intervention described here
How multimodal digital literacy develops critical thinking skills in second language learners
No full textAs Kress argues (2010), human communication is multimodal – i.e., speakers use different semiotic resources to interact, or rather, to make meaning. This implies that speakers acquire skills that
enable them to use all the resources effectively. Literacy then no longer means having competencies in reading and writing verbal texts only but also learning how to interpret, analyse, and evaluate multimodal meanings. Today, another facet of the concept of literacy regards technological development. The pervasiveness
and ubiquity of digital technologies and devices have affected our social practices and shaped our forms of interaction (Domingo et al., 2015). Education, in particular, is a domain where information
technology plays a pivotal role. For this reason, the technology-education binomial pushes educational researchers to reconceptualise the nature of literacy (Kamil et al., 2000, Leu et al., 2004, Leu, 2006). If we also include the necessity for learners to know how to categorise and critically interpret multimodal meanings
– mostly consumed through digital media – the urgency about new pedagogies of literacy is evident.
This theoretical contribution aims to speculate on and expand the concept of ‘literacy’ in order to support a multifaceted approach to education. Multimodality, digitality, and Critical Thinking will be explored and, at the same time, integrated within a holistic view of education and pedagogy with a particular focus on second language learning and teaching
Monitoring developmental trajectories in novel metaphor comprehension in children with ASD: a case study
Get PDFThe study of developmental trajectories in metaphor comprehension has prevailingly addressed typically developing children (TD children, henceforth), and more recently, also children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD, henceforth). Monitoring these trajectories longitudinally illuminates potentialities and residual weaknesses in children having had difficulties in handling figurative language. The present study describes the case of a child with ASD, M.M. (a pseudonym) who received a specific intervention when he was 8,10 to improve sensory metaphor comprehension. Afterwards, his capability to explain physico-psychological metaphors, which are more complex, was monitored across a 5-year span. During this interval, M.M was assessed three times at approximately 18 months distance, and compared to a group of TD children matched by age, school grade, number and dates of assessment. The results at a test measuring physico-psychological metaphors are analysed. Beyond quantitative differences in performance, differences in the developmental trajectories of M.M. and the TD children are outlined. Some implications for clinical assessment and intervention with children with ASD are also pointed out
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Get PDFThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Case report. Theory of mind and figurative language in a child with agenesis of the ccrpus callosum
No full textIn this case report, we studied Theory of Mind (ToM) and figurative language
comprehension in a 7.2-year-old child, conventionally named RJ, with isolated and
complete agenesis of the corpus callosum (ACC), a rare malformation due to the
absence of the corpus callosum, the major tract connecting the two brain hemispheres.
To study ToM, which is the capability to infer the other’s mental states, we used
the classical false belief tasks, and to study figurative language, i.e., those linguistic
usages involving non-literal meanings, we used tasks assessing metaphor and idiom
comprehension. RJ’s intellectual level and his phonological, lexical, and grammatical
abilities were all adequate. In both the ToM false belief tasks and novel sensory metaphor
comprehension, RJ showed a delay of 3 years and a significant gap compared to a
typically developing control group, while in idioms, his performance was at the border of
average. These outcomes suggest that RJ has a specific pragmatic difficulty in all tasks
where he must interpret the other’s communicative intention, as in ToM tasks and novel
sensory metaphor comprehension. The outcomes also open up interesting insights into
the relationships between ToM and figurative language in children with isolated and
complete ACC
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