Using Semantic Priming Technique to Investigate the Semantic Processing in High-functioning Autism
Date Issued
2007
Date
2007
Author(s)
Huang, Chih-Lin
DOI
zh-TW
Abstract
The autistic spectrum disorder involved impairments in reciprocal social interaction and communication and the presence of restricted, stereotyped, and repetitive interests and behaviors. The current research was aimed to investigate the semantic processing in high-functioning autistic young adolescents. Semantic priming effects were evaluated through the naming and lexical decision tasks. Amid the 38 junior high school students, half was high-functioning autistic (HFA) students while the other half served as normal controls in proportion to the sex and the intellectual ability. The stimulus-onset asynchrony (SOA; long: 950ms, short: 250ms), association (high, low), and relation (related, non-related) were three key factors to the experiment. When the SOA was short, the HFA students showed significant semantic priming effects in both tasks to the high-associated related pairs, but not to the low-associated related ones. Under the same circumstances, the normal controls displayed obvious semantic priming effects to all related pairs in the two tasks. When the SOA was long, the HFA students demonstrated no crucial semantic priming effects priming effect in both tasks, while the majority of the normal students had expedited reactions to the related pairs. The experiment drew the conclusion that the high associated related pairs seemed to be in connection with the semantic network in the HFA students, which accounted for the accelerated reaction time rendered by the automatic spreading activation. As for the low-associated related pairs, they were either disconnected or weakly linked with the semantic network and which explained a different semantic organization in the HFA students. With a longer SOA and the needed cognitive strategies, the HFA students would not be able to benefit from the semantics, which suggested they might have difficulties employing higher-level cognitive strategies and retrieving semantic knowledge from the memory. In sum, the HFA students differed from the normal controls in the semantic processing.
Subjects
語意處理
語意促發效果
唸字作業
詞彙判斷作業
自動蔓延激發
認知策略
high-functioning autism
semantic processing
semantic priming effect
lexical-decision task
naming task
automatic spreading activation
cognitive strategies
Type
other
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