Interação fictiva como estratégia comunicativa de crianças ecolálicas com transtorno do espectro autista

Abstract

Individuals with Autistic Spectrum Disorder have poor performance in activities that demand joint attention, imitation and intention reading, which mainly affects their social behavior and communication. Echolalia, the repetition of the exact words from a prior discourse (KANNER, 1943), is related to such cognitive condition (CARPENTER; TOMASELLO, 2000). The echolalic speech of individuals with autism has, in general, a communicative function (SCHULER, 1979; PRIZANT; RYDELL, 1984; PRIZANT; DUCHAN, 1987; RYDELL; MIRENDA, 1991; FERNANDES, 2003; DOBBINSON; PERKINS; BOUCHER, 2003; STERPONI; SHANKEY, 2014). We understand functional echolalic productions as fictive interaction constructions, which consists in the use of discursive reportations, or the pattern of interaction, as communicative strategies. The fictive interaction implies the use of a cognitive domain based on face-to-face interactions applied to other functions in the communicative process, the conversation frame, differently from the merely reportive one. These constructions have been identified in several discursive genres, in different languages and in cases of Broca's aphasia (PASCUAL, 2006; 2014; PASCUAL; SANDLER, 2016). The present work has as objectives: mapping the occurrences of fictive interaction in the echolalic speech, its typology and development in the cases of children with Autisic Spectrum Disorder; compare the results with two control groups, the first corresponding cognitive ages with children with ASD and the second, chronological ages. Two studies were carried out: an empirical study, with audiovisual recording of semi-spontaneous interactions between five autistic children (four boys with severe ASD and one girl with moderate ASD) and their therapists in weekly sessions during one month, totaling four sessions for each child. Based on the findings of the first study, two data elicitation tasks were also developed, applied in the same children with ASD by the therapists. The children in the control groups performed similar interactions in the first study and the same activities in the second study with their mothers. It was observed that children with autism used not only ipsis literal repetitions of the previous discourse, but also mitigated echolalias, in which there was an addition of words in the echolaliclic statement so that it adapted to the context; there was also production of paraphrases and even some more creative occurrences using question-answer pattern. These constructions were used to access the lexicon, to solve difficult grammatical structuring and to refer to characters or people. Children in the control group 1 (two to four years old) also used fictional interaction constructions with repetition of previous discourse when faced with grammatical and discursive difficulties. Children in the control group 2 (six to twelve years old) used fictive interaction constructions in a more creative way, with few occurrences of repetition, and as a discursive option rather than an adaptive strategy. The results suggest that fictive interaction constructions were more effective and more frequent than other strategies in the group of children with ASD. The use of the conversation frame seems to be of great importance for this group to be able to engage in discourse and come up with communicative strategies with its interlocutors.