The impact of sensory processing on executive and cognitive functions in children with autism spectrum disorder in the school context.

Background: Theoretical approaches propose a hierarchical organization of sensory and higher-order cognitive processes, in which sensory processing influence some cognitive and executive functions.

Aims: The main objective of this study was to analyze whether sensory processing dysfunctions can predict the cognitive and executive dysfunctions evaluated in a group of children with level 2 autism spectrum disorder (ASD) in the school context.

Methods And Procedures: Two groups of children participated: an ASD group (n = 40) and a group of children with typical development (the comparison group, n = 40).

Corrigendum: Sensory Processing in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder and/or Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder in the Home and Classroom Contexts.

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2017.

Comprehension of Generalized Conversational Implicatures by Children With and Without Autism Spectrum Disorder.

This study evaluates the comprehension of generalized conversational implicatures (GCI) in children with and without autism spectrum disorder (ASD), using a GCI test constructed based on the Levinson model, which distinguishes between three types of implicatures: type Q (or scalar: "what is not referred to does not occur"); type I ("by default, it is not necessary to say what can be assumed"); and type M ("if someone is expressing something in a not very simple or marked way, it is because s/he is describing a situation that is not very typical, frequent, or prototypical"). In addition to the ASD group ( = 22), two comparison groups were utilized: a group matched on chronological age with the ASD group, but with a higher linguistic age (TCD group, = 22), and a group matched on linguistic age with the ASD group, but with a lower chronological age (TLD group, = 22). In all cases, linguistic age was assessed with the Peabody test.

Sensory Processing in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder and/or Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder in the Home and Classroom Contexts.

Children with neurodevelopmental disorders often show impairments in sensory processing (SP) and higher functions. The main objective of this study was to compare SP, praxis and social participation (SOC) in four groups of children: ASD Group ( = 21), ADHD Group ( = 21), ASD+ADHD Group ( = 21), and Comparison Group ( = 27). Participants were the parents and teachers of these children who were 5-8 years old ( = 6.

Semantic Verbal Fluency in Children with and without Autism Spectrum Disorder: Relationship with Chronological Age and IQ.

We administered a semantic verbal fluency (SVF) task to two groups of children (age range from 5 to 8): 47 diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD Group) and 53 with typical development (Comparison Group), matched on gender, chronological age, and non-verbal IQ. Four specific indexes were calculated from the SVF task, reflecting the different underlying cognitive strategies used: clustering (component of generativity and lexical-semantic access), and switching (executive component, cognitive flexibility). First, we compared the performance of the two groups on the different SVF task indicators, with the ASD group scoring lower than the Comparison Group, although the difference was greater on switching than on clustering.

Sensory processing in children with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Relationship with non-verbal IQ, autism severity and Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder symptomatology.

The main objective of this study was to analyze in a sample of children with ASD the relationship between sensory processing, social participation and praxis impairments and some of the child's characteristics, such as non-verbal IQ, severity of ASD symptoms and the number of ADHD symptoms (inattention and hyperactivity/impulsivity), both in the home and main-classroom environments. Participants were the parents and teachers of 41 children with ASD from 5 to 8 years old (M=6.09).

[Language and executive functioning skills of students with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and in reading comprehension difficulties (RCD)].

The aim of this work was to study the specificity of deficits in linguistic and executive functioning of students with ADHD and with RCD and to determine the profile of deficits in the comorbid group (ADHD+RCD). Participants in the study were 84 students, ages 12-16 years divided into four groups with an equal number of subjects (N= 21): ADHD, RCD, ADHD+RCD and comparison group (without ADHD and without RCD). We measured vocabulary, oral comprehension, lexical access, verbal and visual working memory, inhibition and attention.