Abstract
This is a case report to show how an autistic boy (CA 6:3, MA 5:0), who could not appropriately speak about his own past experiences, learns such a skill. His verbal responses to several types of questions by a tester were analyzed in a multiple-baseline research design. The child was asked to talk about his experiences at kindergarten in the morning with the tester during a 20 minute treatment session in a clinical test-room on every Saturday afternoon. Analysis of all his verbal expressions from the developmental and behavior-analytic points of view leads to the following conclusions. (1) His verbal responses, especially correct answers, gradually increased with ups and downs in each session through the course of treatment, but they were much less than those of a normal child. (2) Improvement in his skill to speak about his past experiences appeared at first in syntax, and then in semantics after several sessions. (3) In the early stage of treatment, he got a few correct responses by saying simply "Yes" or "No" to questions. Then, good answers to "What…?" type questions soon developed. It was more difficult for him to answer questions of the type such as "Where…?", "How…?", "Which…?" and "Why…?" than to do "What…?" questions. He gave no correct answer to questions with "Who" or "When". (4) Tendencies to say nothing, to talk to himself for a long time and to repeat the same words, phrases or sentences in the conversation did not change over a half year. The generalization of the results of this study to other settings or environments where continuous treatment or supervision is difficult awaits further research.
