Discussion of Issues Related to Assessment of Signed or Spoken Language Development in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

This chapter is a joint discussion of key items presented in Chapters 4.1 and 4.2 related to the assessment of deaf and hearing children on the autism spectrum . From these chapters it becomes apparent that a number of aspects associated with signed language assessment are relevant to spoken language assessment. For example, there are several precautions to bear in mind about language assessments obtained via an interpreter. Some of these precautions apply solely to D/HH children, while others are applicable to assessments with hearing children in multilingual contexts. Equally, there are some aspects of spoken language assessment that can be applied to signed language assessment. These include the importance of assessing pragmatic language skills, assessing multiple areas of language development, differentiating between ASD and other developmental disorders, and completing the language evaluation within a developmental framework. The authors conclude with suggestions for both spoken and signed language assessment.