Object Categorization in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD)
type: CreativeWork
description: The purpose of this study was to investigate hierarchical object categorization in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), examining three levels of category inclusiveness (superordinate, basic, subordinate) across three tasks (sequential touching task, generalized imitation task, sorting task) in three domains (animals, tools, kitchen utensils) in the same group of children with ASD. Previous research on the categorization abilities of children with ASD has shown mixed results. This study was designed to clarify past discrepancies in the literature. Ten children with ASD participated in this study (mean CA = 4 years, 10 months; range 3 to 6 years; mean VMA = 3 years, 3 months; range 9 months to 6 years, 5 months). In the sequential touching task, children saw objects from two categories, and their spontaneous touching of those objects was recorded. Results showed no differences between category levels. Within level, participants differentiated between animate and inanimate domains on the superordinate level, and categorized basic level animate categories, having more difficulty with subordinate level categories. The generalized imitation task, in which the child must imitate the experimenter's modeled action with an appropriate exemplar, showed that participants generalized significantly better than chance on superordinate and basic level categories, but similar to chance on subordinate level categories. The sorting task, in which the child must sort eight objects (from two categories) into two separate boxes, also revealed no differences between level, but revealed sorting better than chance on the subordinate level only. The proportion of correct sorting was positively correlated with language. A positive correlation was found between the generalized imitation and sorting tasks, suggesting that the tasks may be tapping similar background knowledge. Overall, while children did not show significantly better performance on one level over another, two of the th…
abstract: The purpose of this study was to investigate hierarchical object categorization in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), examining three levels of category inclusiveness (superordinate, basic, subordinate) across three tasks (sequential touching task, generalized imitation task, sorting task) in three domains (animals, tools, kitchen utensils) in the same group of children with ASD. Previous research on the categorization abilities of children with ASD has shown mixed results. This study was designed to clarify past discrepancies in the literature. Ten children with ASD participated in this study (mean CA = 4 years, 10 months; range 3 to 6 years; mean VMA = 3 years, 3 months; range 9 months to 6 years, 5 months). In the sequential touching task, children saw objects from two categories, and their spontaneous touching of those objects was recorded. Results showed no differences between category levels. Within level, participants differentiated between animate and inanimate domains on the superordinate level, and categorized basic level animate categories, having more difficulty with subordinate level categories. The generalized imitation task, in which the child must imitate the experimenter's modeled action with an appropriate exemplar, showed that participants generalized significantly better than chance on superordinate and basic level categories, but similar to chance on subordinate level categories. The sorting task, in which the child must sort eight objects (from two categories) into two separate boxes, also revealed no differences between level, but revealed sorting better than chance on the subordinate level only. The proportion of correct sorting was positively correlated with language. A positive correlation was found between the generalized imitation and sorting tasks, suggesting that the tasks may be tapping similar background knowledge. Overall, while children did not show significantly better performance on one level over another, two of the th…
author: Vitrano, Jaime
keywords: Developmental Psychology, autism; categorization; cognitive processes; conceptual development
date published: 2015-05-27T07:00:00Z
date modified: 2026-07-24T01:58:57Z
provider: City University of New York - Graduate Center
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: The Graduate School and University Center of The City University of New York