2016-01-012024-05-13https://scholars.lib.ntu.edu.tw/handle/123456789/650703摘要：高功能自閉症兒童的語文智力分數在正常範圍，但是經常出現語用理解的困難。目前有少數研究開始呈現，這群兒童的「情緒語調」（語用的重要成份之一）知覺困難。特別在情緒語調和詞彙語意線索衝突時，例如，以悲傷的語調說出「快樂」這個詞，高功能自閉症兒童不易正確解讀語音背後的說話者情緒，以致出現語用障礙。然而，目前尚未清楚哪些心理機制，導致高功能自閉症兒童的情緒語調處理限制。由於情緒語調和詞彙訊息衝突情況下的情緒判斷，包含多種心理機制，本研究認為三項基本歷程可能影響情緒判斷。首先，情緒語調經由語音傳遞，而且先前的實驗作業要求兒童分類語調的情緒，因此，「分類語音」的能力，極可能為分類情緒語調的基本能力。其次，當語調和詞彙線索衝突時，兒童需要把情緒詞中情緒分類的向度，從詞彙轉到語調。因此，能夠按照情境要求「彈性轉換」處理向度，即是另一可能影響高功能自閉症兒童情緒語調判斷的基本機制。最後，不易進行語調和詞彙線索衝突情況下的情緒判斷，也可能是自閉症兒童詞彙學習的過程和一般兒童不同，以致無法使用相似的詞彙表徵處理語調和詞義衝突的情況。所以，「詞彙學習」的差異也可能是解讀情緒困難的心理機制。此外，目前只有少數fMRI 研究探索高功能自閉症兒童中，和情緒語調處理作業相關的神經網路；而尚無研究同時檢視他們和語音類別知覺有關的腦區活化類型，並且探索和自閉症兒童處理情緒語調和詞義衝突的神經關連性。這個計畫的目標在於檢視高功能自閉症兒童的語用（情緒語調）表現，及影響這項表現的心理機制和相關的大腦活動。本計畫預計進行六項實驗。實驗一將檢視，和對照組兒童相比，是否高功能自閉症兒童在處理情緒詞彙的語調，特別在詞義和語調線索衝突時，出現任何障礙。實驗二將探索高功能自閉症兒童和正常兒童的語音分類知覺，及彈性轉換處理向度的表現。實驗三將以fMRI 研究兒童分類語音時，會活化哪些腦區；並檢視高功能自閉症兒童在處理語音向度轉換時，是否與基本語音處理活化不同腦區的假設。實驗四將以眼動儀檢視高功能自閉症兒童學習情緒詞的動態歷程；而實驗五除檢視自閉症兒童和對照組的新詞記憶是否出現差異之外，也檢視自閉症兒童能否在新詞當中，彈性轉換情緒語調和詞彙意義向度。實驗六則以事件關連電位檢視和自閉症兒童情緒語調處理相關的神經訊號，並檢視是否自閉症兒童的基本聽覺處理歷程和對照組不同。這個計畫的研究成果，將不止提供高功能自閉症兒童在處理語言單位時的行為及神經關連性資料，並具有哪些心理及神經機制會導致這群兒童語用缺損的理論意涵。<br> Abstract: Despite of normal verbal intelligence, individuals with high-functioning autism (HFA)usually experience the difficulty in comprehending pragmatics of language. Few studiesrevealed that the impairment in perceiving the emotional prosody, one component ofpragmatics, might lead to the pragmatic deficits in children with HFA. The difficulty toprocess emotional prosody is prominent when HFA children encounter lexical/prosodicinformation conflict condition. Moreover, it is unclear what psychosocial mechanisms wouldaccount for the prosodic deficits in HFA children. Three mechanisms are proposed in thisstudy to explore the psychological mechanisms. First, the categorization of speech soundsmight serve as one of the basic mechanisms because emotional prosody is embedded withspeech sounds and “categorization” is the basic ability in the categorization of emotions.Second, flexibility of dimension switch is another alternative. The word learning process ofHFA children might play a role in the categorization of emotional prosody when prosodicand lexical information is conflict.Among the few fMRI studies aimed to investigate the brain activation patterns involvinglanguage abilities in children with HFA, none have studied the categorical perception ofspeech sounds. In addition, it is unclear what neural makers would reflect thelexical/prosodic conflict in HFA children. The proposed project aims to explore underlingmechanisms of prosodic deficits in HFA children and to correlate them with the brainactivation patterns.Six experiments will be conducted in this project. Experiment 1 will investigate whetherchildren with HFA exhibit any prosodic deficits in emotional prosody as compared tocontrols. Experiment 2 will assess whether children with HFA perform any deficits in thecategorization of speech sounds. In addition, Experiment 2 also explores the flexibility ofdimension switch in phonetic identification. Experiment 3 will use the fMRI to investigatethe brain activation patterns in categorization of speech sounds, and test the prediction thatchildren with HFA activate more cortical regions in the conflict task. Experiment 4 will usethe eye tracker to examine the on-line word learning processes of HFA children. Experiment5 will assess whether the retention of novel words in HFA children is poor than TD childrenand the flexibility to switch dimension between lexical and prosodic information.Experiment 6 will use the event-related potential technique to investigate the neural makersof emotional prosody and lexical/prosodic conflict condition in HFA children. Results of thisproposed project will not only provide behavioral and neural correlate data on the processingof language units in children with HFA, but also provide theoretical implications on whatpsychological and neural mechanisms might cause pragmatic deficits in these children.高功能自閉症兒童語音類別知覺詞彙學習向度轉換彈性情緒語調腦區活化類型事件關連電位children with high-functioning autismcategorical speech perceptionword learningflexibility to switch dimensionsemotional prosodybrain activation patternsevent-related potentials