Understanding the roles of theory of mind and receptive prosody in reading comprehension among Chinese children with Autism spectrum disorder

Abstract

The present study examined the performance of theory of mind (ToM) skills, receptive prosody and Chinese reading comprehension among school-aged children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), and the relationships between these three areas. Fifty-five 9-to-12- year-old children with ASD and 60 age-matched controls were tested on nonverbal intelligence, working memory, expressive vocabulary, basic and advanced ToM skills, receptive prosody, Chinese word reading and reading comprehension. Results showed that children with ASD were impaired in both basic and advanced ToM skills, particularly in justifying mental states of others. Deficits in receptive prosody in the ASD group were also revealed. Moreover, children with ASD showed difficulties in reading comprehension despite their comparable word reading skills with the control group. Advanced ToM skill was shown to be a unique predictor of Chinese reading comprehension in the ASD but not the control group. These findings implied the importance of incorporating the elements of ToM and receptive prosody into the reading assessment and intervention for children with ASD.