Communication deficits: Language delays & aspergers

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Hello all, I noticed that many of the individuals on this board had language delays earlier in life (Including me), suggesting that they might be affected by communication deficits. This is similar to those with aspergers because aspergers largely has communication deficits in the nonverbal domain (As can be inferred from the board, not too many of those with aspergers seem to have problems adequately and fully expressing themselves on the board.), while those with expressive and/or receptive deficits have deficits primarily in the verbal domain even though the nonverbal domain might also be affected (Which itself could/would show up on the board.). With communication deficits in any part of the communication process, people will naturally prefer those who are "easier to talk to" (I.e., concisely gets point across which places little demand on the listener, accurately and quickly interprets what the person is communicating, and not introducing "eerie" delays in the response that people associate with "creepiness" and/or "stupidity".), and so I'd imagine those with deficits in the verbal domain would probably tend to be ignored/avoided. So, those with deficits in the verbal or non-verbal domain would probably feel like they are on the "wrong planet", thus that explains why there might be a lot of language-delay individuals who aren't strictly aspergian in the forums.

So, was there anyone else with significant language-delays on here and/or expressive difficulties? Are you considered "stupid" by others despite intelligence test scores and/or intellectual accomplishments suggesting quite the opposite? Do you have problems with verbal recall (That is, you're thinking of a concept and the "right word" takes a significant amount of time to recall.)? Do you consider yourself to have poor rote memory?

Well:

I didn't have a speech delay. I actually started to speak early.

I do have expressive difficulties, in that I am sometimes completely unable to translate fully realized thoughts into language and describe them appropriately. Of course when that happens, I'm not posting those thoughts.

I also have expressive difficulties verbally as anything I haven't rehearsed in some way (writing it down, playing through it alone, etc) is somewhat difficult for me to say.

I have some trouble with word finding, and I have developed far too many cognitive tricks to remember the words I lose.

I have a fairly poor verbal working memory despite my vocabulary, early speech, and hyperlexia. I do not memorize speeches, dialogue, etc. very easily.

I didn't speak until I was more than 2 1/2. Was using full coherent sentences by my third birthday, then lost the ability to speak altogether and had to be retaught. I was never seen as stupid though. I was seen as socially inept, but not stupid. I am also hyperlexic, and I have an above average IQ. I was always good in school, and because I didn't have many friends, I spent a lot of time learning.

I started speaking at 12.5 months, I don't think this would be considered delayed. Would it?

Nope.

Not at all. That is average, but also a bit early. If you were speaking with lots of words (rather than just Mama and Dada and things like that), then that is somewhat early.

I wasn't trying to suggest that people with aspergers had language delays. I just noticed that there were a sizable amount of individuals on the forums with aspergers, and then there were also a sizable amount of individuals on the forums with language delays, and that both camps were "similar" in that the asperger's group was affected by nonverbal communication and those with language delays might be affected in verbal communication, and so both camps are affected by communication problems. (I'm thinking my post and the resulting miscommunication was a prime example of expressive deficits. )

Aspergers = (Problems) reading body language and literal use of language, language delay = (Problems) expressing oneself and possibly affects understanding others.

EDIT: Maybe this post was an example of a receptive deficit for I wrongly assumed that someone interpreted my original post as suggesting those with aspergers had language delays. Hmmmm...

Last edited by swbluto on 17 Apr 2011, 8:46 pm, edited 2 times in total.

Really? That's interesting that you mentioned that because I was about to go test my verbal working memory through Carpenter's "Reading Span test". It seems I'm having a hard time encoding information in history class (Which might be faulted due to the lecturer's poor grammar and distinct chinese accent) that no one else seems to have problems with, which I'm suspecting that verbal working memory might be responsible for. (Verbal working memory is suspected to be the mechanism by which verbal information is encoded into longterm memory, and so difficulty in retrieving long-term verbal information is thought to imply verbal working memory problems.)

I kind of wonder if that's typical of aspergers individuals? I saw in another thread that aspergers individuals typically had poor rote memory, especially for disorganized information.

Who said you were?

And that would be a good thing anyway, since one of the diagnostic criteria for Aspergers is no language delay.

Huh? As far as I know, a LOT of people with Asperger's actually can't read body language. I know I can't.

Is this due to expressive language deficits or literal interpretation of language? Hmmm....

I was referring to the types of problems.

No one, it seemed that some might have had that impression, though. So, I just wanted to clear it up in case it might have been a problem.

Oh...you meant that we have problems with reading body language, not that we are good at it??

One of the hallmarks of ASD is a deficit in nonverbal communication. That is why we don't get body language, facial expressions, sarcasm (which is a nonverbal form of verbal communication--you have to be able to understand what is not being said), etc.

For me personally, the only thing I get is what you tell me. That is all. I can come to assumptions about what you might mean, but I am very rarely correct (and if I am correct, it is by fluke).

It seems many guys in relationships with girls have that difficulty. If only they were told everything and instead of being forced to be mind readers and excellent body language readers, hardy har har.

LOL Well, if I ever have a relationship, which I doubt, he can rest assured that he will not have those problems with me.