A Study On Referential Communication Skills In Children With Moderate Intellectual Disabilities

Referential communication skills refer to speaker describe a referent so that listener can identify the referent from other nonreferent.,it includes speaker skills and listener skills.Referential communication is one of the most basic functions of language,it also is a component of other more complex types of communication functions.Referential communication skills are important for an individual’s social adaptation,When individuals cannot express adequate messages,social interaction problems may occur.Due to the limitations of cognitive development,communication disorders are common in children with intellectual disabilities.The research on referential communication skills of children with intellectual disabilities has made considerable achievements abroad.However,there is no specific study on the referential communication skills of children with intellectual disabilities in China.The purpose of this paper is to explore the characteristics,influencing factors of referential communication skills in children with moderate intellectual disabilities and the effectiveness of relevant intervention methods.This study includes four sub-studies,Study1 examined the characteristics of speaker skills in children with moderate intellectual disabilities;Study 2 examined the characteristics of listener skills in children with moderate intellectual disabilities;Study3 explored the influencing factors of referential communication skills in children with moderate intellectual disabilities;Study 4 explored the effectiveness of integrated intervention for children with moderate intellectual disabilities,address deficiencies in referential communication skills.The subjects were selected from 4 special education schools and 1 common kindergarten,81 children with moderate intellectual disabilities and 81 typically developing children with matched receptive vocabulary were selected by convenient sampling.Experimental method was used to study the characteristics of speaker skills,listener skills and intervention,and task test was used to study the influencing factors.The main research conclusions are as follows:Study 1 examined the characteristics of speaker skills in children with moderate intellectual disabilities through speaking task of the common object description.The results showed:The number of correct responses for speaking(accurate descriptions of referents)of children with moderate intellectual disabilities was significantly lower than that of typically developing children in the control group,they expressed higher rates of inadequate messages,lower rates of adequate messages and redundant messages;The quality of conversational repair was lower in children with moderate intellectual disabilities,they adopted more partial addition and less complete addition to repair initial ambiguous message;Children with moderate intellectual disabilities need more feedbacks to complete conversation repair.With the increase of grade level,the number of correct responses for speaking of children with moderate intellectual disabilities increases gradually,the rate of adequate messages and redundant messages gradually increases and the ratio of inadequate information gradually decreases;the percentage of effective conversational repairs gradually increasing in children with moderate intellectual disabilities,the number of feedback required for conversational repairs is significantly reduced.Study2 examined the characteristics of listener skills in children with moderate intellectual disabilities through listening task of the common object description.The results showed:The number of correct responses for listening(identifying indicated objects)and the ratio of requests for clarification were significantly lower in children with moderate intellectual disabilities than in children with typical development,they make clarification requests primarily through confirmation requests.With the increase of grade level,the number of correct responses for listening and the ratio of requests for clarification of children with moderate intellectual disabilities increased gradually.Study 3 explored the effects of language(receptive vocabulary level),executive function(working memory,inhibitory control,cognitive flexibility)and theory of mind on referential communication skills in children with moderate intellectual disabilities.The results showed:The level of receptive vocabulary,working memory and cognitive flexibility significantly predicted the number of correct responses for speaking in children with moderate intellectual disabilities.The level of receptive vocabulary not only has a direct positive predictive effect on the number of correct responses for speaking in speaker of children with moderate intellectual disabilities,there are also two indirect paths to affect the number of correct responses for speaking: Through the independent mediation of cognitive flexibility,through the chain mediation of working memory and cognitive flexibility.Cognitive flexibility significantly predicted the number of complete addition for conversational repairs in children with moderate intellectual disabilities.The level of receptive vocabulary and inhibition control had significant predictive effects on the number of correct responses for listening in children with moderate intellectual disabilities.The level of receptive vocabulary not only directly predicted the number of correct responses for listening in children with moderate intellectual disabilities,it also indirectly influenced the number of correct responses for listening by the independent mediating effect of inhibition control.Cognitive flexibility significantly predicted the total number of clarification requests for children with moderate intellectual disabilities.Study 4 explored the effectiveness of integrated intervention of difference rule feedback+ role reversal.The results showed: The number of correct responses to the speaking and listening tasks and the rate of clarification requests were significantly improved,the number of feedback required for conversational repairs is significantly reduced in the posttest.In terms of the number of correct responses to the speaking and listening tasks,the number of feedback required for conversational repairs,and the ratio of clarification requests,intervention effectiveness transfer to a new similar test task.In terms of the number of correct responses to the speaking and listening tasks,and the number of feedback required for conversational repairs,produces a transfer effect across task mode,that is,the intervention effect of speaking task or listening task is transferred to the opposite task.To sum up,this study systematically explored the characteristics,influencing factors and intervention methods of referential communication skills in children with moderate intellectual disabilities.The results show: the development level of referential communication skills of children with moderate intellectual disabilities lags behind that of typical developing children with matched receptive vocabulary level.With the increase of grade level,the level of referential communication skills of children with moderate intellectual disabilities gradually improved;Referential communication skills of moderate intellectual disabilities were more easily affected by enabling skills.Difficulties in the application of procedural rules restrict the referential communication performance of children with moderate intellectual disabilities;The integrated intervention of difference rule feedback + role reversal can improve the referential communication performance of children with moderate intellectual disabilities.