What Disorder Causes a Person to Repeat Phrases Over and Over Again

3 Things You Should Know About Echolalia

By Lauren Lowry
Hanen Certified SLP and Clinical Staff Writer

Many children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) utilise echolalia, which means they repeat others' words or sentences. They might echo the words of familiar people (parents, teachers), or they might echo sentences from their favourite video.

When children echo words right afterward they hear them, information technology'due south known as firsthand echolalia. When they echo words at a later time, it'due south known as delayed echolalia. Equally a result of the time delay, delayed echolalia may seem very unusual because these sentences are used out of context. For example, a child might relish a song his teacher sang at circle time, and and so afterwards enquire to sing it at home by maxim "Information technology'south circle time" instead of proverb the name of the vocal.

While it might be hard to figure out what a kid is trying to say when he or she uses echolalia, learning a lilliputian chip about this blazon of speech can help you figure out the meaning behind his or her bulletin. Here are 3 things y'all need to know about echolalia.

1. Children with ASD use echolalia because they larn linguistic communication differently

Typically developing children tend to begin learning language by first understanding and using single words, and and then they gradually string them together to brand phrases and sentences.

Children with ASD often follow a different route. Their commencement attempts at language may exist longer "chunks" of language (phrases or sentences), which they are non able to interruption down into smaller parts. These chunks are more grammatically complicated than they could put together themselves, and they don't sympathise what the individual words mean.

For instance, a kid might say "It's time for your bath" every fourth dimension he hears his male parent filling up the bathtub. He knows those words have something to do with bath time, only he doesn't know what "it's," "time," "for," "your," and/or "bathroom" mean individually, and he tin can't use these words in other sentences. Because he doesn't understand all of the words, he uses the pronoun incorrectly (using "your bathroom" instead of "my bath").

We can help children who utilise echolalia by helping them learn to break down longer chunks of language and empathise what the individual words mean then they tin use them more than flexibly.

There are many reasons children might use echolalia for a chatty purpose.

ii. Echolalia often has a purpose or bulletin

There may be times when children use echolalia to soothe themselves when they're upset or to rehearse something, and in those cases echolalia may not be intended to transport a bulletin to someone. But there are also many reasons why children utilise echolalia for a communicative purpose, such as [1,2]:

• To inquire for thingdue south (e.g. a kid might say "Do you want a cookie?" to ask for a cookie, as he'due south heard others offering cookies this way before)
• To commencement an interaction or keep it going (east.1000. a kid might initiate a game of Hide and Seek by proverb a line from the game, similar "Fix or not, hither I come!")
• To describe someone's attention to something (e.g. a child might draw attending to something he's noticed past using a line he's heard earlier to draw attention to something else, like "It'south a bird, it's a plane, it's Superman!")
• To protest something (e.chiliad. if a child imitates "Yous don't want to wear those pants?" equally his parent is getting out his apparel, he might really mean "I don't want to wear those pants")
• To answer yes (eastward.g. if a child imitates "Practice yous want some yogurt?" correct after he's been asked that question, he may actually want some yogurt and actually mean "yep")

Figuring out the meaning backside echolalia can be catchy! Looking at the context is very important, and thinking about the fourth dimension the kid originally heard it tin can help likewise. With a little detective piece of work, information technology'southward possible to figure out what he'southward trying to tell you.

3. Echolalia is a stepping stone to flexible linguistic communication

Researchers who study echolalia have noticed patterns in the way it progresses in children with ASD [1]:

• Initially, children echo "chunks" of language without understanding what they hateful
• Then, children start to change these chunks of linguistic communication. They mix and recombine words and phrases they have used (this is chosen "mitigated echolalia").
• Equally they showtime to understand more language, some children use shorter sentences or merely use one or two words to express themselves.
• Gradually, language becomes more spontaneous and flexible. Echolalia might be used occasionally, especially when a child is tired, confused or frustrated. Simply more words and phrases are used appropriately and flexibly in one case the child'southward understanding increases.

Echolalia can exist confusing. Simply by understanding why children use it and how it serves as a bridge to more flexible linguistic communication, you lot will be better equipped to aid a child who uses echolalia.

Stay tuned for our next commodity with tips for helping children who use echolalia to communicate.

References

1. Prizant, B. (1983). Language Acquisition and communicative behavior in autism: Toward an understanding of the "Whole" of it. Periodical of Speech and Hearing Disorders, 48, 296-307.
2. Stiegler, L. North. (2015). Examining the echolalia literature: Where do speech-language pathologists stand? American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 24, 750-762.

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