@article{bibcite_1121,
  author = {Arielle Belluck and Momna Ahmed and Adele Goldberg},
  title = {Autistic children with vocabularies equivalent to non-autistic 2-year-olds display the shape bias},
  abstract = {<p><strong>Purpose</strong>: As toddlers, non-autistic children learn to prioritize the shape of objects when extending a new countable noun, but not a new adjective.\&nbsp; Since autistic children are typically delayed in language learning they do not learn an appropriate {\textquotedblleft}shape bias{\textquotedblright} until they are older. Yet prior work has claimed that the shape bias poses a <em>specific</em> challenge, lasting until and unless autistic children{\textquoteright}s vocabularies reach that of non-autistic 4-5-year-olds.\&nbsp; <strong>Methods</strong>: The current study tests a large cohort of autistic preschoolers (<em>N</em> = 102) and a control group of non-autistic 2-year-olds (<em>N</em> = 31) on novel noun and adjective extensions. <strong>Results:</strong> Included autistic children who understood and completed the task (<em>n</em> = 67) displayed equivalent expressive vocabulary and equally strong performance as non-autistic 2-year-olds. Autistic children excluded for failure to understand or engage with the tasks (<em>n</em> = 35), were found to comprise a distinct subgroup, with only {\textonequarter} the vocabulary and more autism characteristics than included autistic children. Six autistic children with somewhat lower shape bias performance showed significant improvement after an eight-week intervention. <strong>Conclusion</strong>: The shape bias does not pose a specific<em>\&nbsp;</em>challenge to autistic children if and when their vocabularies reach that of non-autistic 2-year-olds.\&nbsp;Thus, autism-related generalization challenges do not result in specific difficulty extending word meanings on the basis of single feature: shape.</p>},
}