Pattern of semantic errors in autism: a brief research report.

Semantic or vocabulary errors were measured among children with autism and mild learning disability and children with mild learning disability only (six children of 7.9-8.7 years in each group), testing the hypothesis that these were common in both groups. Different variables were investigated such as breadth of vocabulary and number of vocabulary errors, type of paraphasias, and mechanisms used to name the meanings that children were not aware of or could not recall, and the particular meanings that were difficult for each group. Preliminary findings showed that vocabulary errors were similar in both groups, except under-extension, which was not used by the autism group. Children with autism tended to use all mechanisms in order to name something they did not know and to focus on parts of the object in order to name it, while unknown words were similar in both groups.