Echolalia: How can we make it functional?
“My child often repeats what I say at inappropriate times.”
“My child memorizes lines from his favorite shows.”
These are comments that speech therapists often hear, specifically from parents of children who have Autism Spectrum Disorder.
Echolalia occurs when a child repeats what he/she hears either immediately after hearing the utterance (immediate echolalia) or hours to days after hearing the utterance (delayed echolalia). Echolalia is often non-communicative or self-stimulatory. The child may repeat lines from or his favorite movie or even repeat a conversation he/she heard. For example, during dinner time the child may say, “To infinity and beyond!” The child may do this to self-calm or for self-stimulation as the utterance is not related to the situational context. However, echolalia can also be communicative or functional in nature, in which the child repeats something he/she has heard in the past for a specific communicative purpose such as requesting or commenting. For example, when a child sees his/her parent take out a puzzle, he/she may say, “Do you want to do a puzzle?”
When completing a task the child may say “good job.” Children who present with echolalia of this type because they have frequently heard these utterances in these specific situational contexts and therefore associate the entire utterance with the situation. This occurs because children with ASD typically learn language as a unit unit as opposed to learning language with single words. For example, the child may not be able to independently use the word “do” in a novel sentence, however, he/she is able to use the entire sentence “Do you want to do a puzzle?” The child may not understand exactly what the sentence means in its entirety but he/she does understand that it relates to the context and therefore, says it to communicate.
In online speech therapy, we work on making echolalia functional and appropriate according to the context. You can also work with your child at home to make communicative echolalia functional or to direct your child away from using non-communicative echolalia. If your child repeats lines from a favorite TV show while he/she is working on a puzzle, you can redirect your child back to the puzzle by showing him/her where a piece goes. If your child says, “It’s time for you to eat a snack,” when you put crackers on the table, you can repeat what he/she says, but indirectly correct him/her by saying “It’s time to eat.”
Echolalia often results in children demonstrating difficulty using pronouns correctly because they repeat what others say to them using “you” and “your” pronouns. To eradicate that, it is helpful for you to speak to your child as if you were your child. For example, instead of saying, ‘it’s time for your bath,” you can say, “it’s time to take a bath,” or “I’m going to take a bath.” You can also assist with pronoun confusion by having your child point to the person he/she is speaking to in relation to themselves. For instance, when your child says, “you,” direct him/her to point to the person he/she is speaking to, and when your child says, “me,” or “I,” you can direct him/her to point to himself/herself.
Working with echolalia can be tricky and sometimes confusing for parents. It is important to remember to determine the type and reasoning behind the echolalia in order to determine how to work with your child. A speech therapist is a great resource to help you navigate the sometimes confusing waters of echolalia.
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