Imitation is an early social communication skill defined as copying observed behavior. Imitation skills are classified both according to the body part where the imitated action takes place and the time when the imitated action takes place. In the literature, three types of imitation skills are mentioned, namely object imitation, motor imitation and vocal imitation, depending on the body part where the action takes place. While object imitation involves imitating actions performed with objects, motor imitations are a type of imitation that includes imitation of body movements, large and small muscle motor actions and gestures that do not involve objects. He distinguished oral motor imitations from motor imitations and considered them as a separate type of imitation. Oral motor imitations include imitation of actions related to the mouth area on the face (e.g., sticking out the tongue and moving it to both sides of the mouth, making kissing movements). Voice imitations consist of imitations of meaningful and non-meaningful words and sounds. Depending on the time when the imitated action takes place, there are three types of imitation skills: immediate imitation, delayed imitation and deferred imitation. While immediate imitation skills are defined as performing the same action performed by the observed individual simultaneously with the observed individual; Delayed imitation skills are defined as repeating the observed action shortly after the model. In delayed imitation skills, the child performs the same action that he has previously observed after a long time without being modeled again.
It is accepted that babies' acquisition of imitation skills is an important developmental step from both social and cognitive perspectives. He emphasized that there is a relationship between imitation and social interactions, and stated that imitation serves two functions in infancy: understanding complex observations and mutual social communication. Therefore, imitation is used for learning and social communication in infancy. In addition to being an important tool for babies to learn new behaviors, imitation continues to function as a tool for learning throughout life. It is developing. Imitations made for social communication purposes are one of the basic building blocks of purposeful communication in normally developing children and children with developmental delays.
In normally developing children, imitation occurs in the early stages of development in infancy. Babies are born with a primitive representational ability to imitate facial-mouth movements. Babies 1-4. Repeats own behavior imitated by someone else in months 4-8. Between months, they repeat the behaviors they have produced spontaneously before. With the onset of purposeful communication, they begin to understand that other individuals are purposeful beings. At the 12th month, they use this information to decide what the person performing an action is trying to do in the context of imitation and to decide which element of the action they observe to imitate. On average, in the 18th month, delayed imitation skills begin to be acquired.
One of the non-verbal social communication disorders seen in children with ASD is experienced in imitation development. There are many studies in the literature showing that children with ASD experience limitations in imitation skills compared to their typically developing peers, and that their imitation performance is significantly lower than children with different developmental delays. The fact that imitation skills in children with ASD are limited in comparison to both normally developing and developmentally delayed children shows that the limitation in imitation skills is one of the distinctive features of ASD. Charman et al. (1997) compared the imitation skills of 20-month-old children with ASD, children with developmental delays, and typically developing children; They found that when nonverbal mental age was controlled, children with ASD showed significantly lower imitation performance than both typically developing and developmentally delayed children. Dawson et al. (1998) matched children diagnosed with ASD, Down syndrome, and typically developing children according to their receptive language intelligence ages and communication scores, and children with Down syndrome and ASD according to their chronological ages, and examined whether there were differences in imitation behaviors between groups. As a result of the research, children with ASD imitate both immediately and immediately. They found that they performed lower than other groups in both delayed imitation and delayed imitation. While evaluating imitation skills in their studies, both Charman et al. (1997) and Dawson et al. (1998) performed an action with an object in a structured environment and then presented the object to the child for imitation.
Children with ASD, children with developmental delays Compared to children, they show limitations in their imitation skills. In their study, Rogers et al. (2003) compared the imitation development of 26-41 month-old children with ASD with those of normally developing children, children with developmental delays (Down syndrome, chromosomal disorders and developmental delays) and children with Fragile X syndrome. They found that their scores were significantly lower than all groups. Stone, Ousley, and Littleford (1997) conducted a study comparing the imitation skills of children with ASD between the ages of 26 and 36 months with normally developing children matched according to mental age and with children with developmental delays matched according to mental age, chronological age, and expressive language score. Researchers who claim that children with ASD perform significantly lower in imitation than children with developmental delays have claimed that the limitations seen in imitation are a disorder specific to autism. Structured imitation procedures were used in the studies of Rogers et al. (2003), Stone, Ousley and Littleford (1997) and Turan and Ökcün-Akçamuş (2013), and in these studies, object imitation skills, motor imitation skills and oral motor imitation skills were evaluated. As a result of these studies, it was found that children with ASD showed limitations in all areas of imitation. Stone, Ousley, and Littleford (1997) found that children had more difficulty in motor imitation skills than in imitation skills with objects and in imitations with meaningless objects, such as walking a toy comb on the table, than in imitations with meaningful objects, such as walking a toy dog on the table. When the limitations in imitation skills are examined according to imitation types, it is seen that children with ASD score higher in object imitation skills than in motor imitations, and in meaningless object imitations, It has been observed that they have more difficulty in imitating meaningful objects than in imitating meaningful objects.
Children with ASD show lower performance in spontaneous imitation skills than in structured imitation skills. Ingersoll (2008b) conducted a study comparing the structured imitation skills of normally developing children and children with ASD, matched according to their non-verbal intelligence ages, with their spontaneous imitation skills in a natural environment. As a result of the research, it was found that children with ASD performed lower than typically developing children in both types of imitation. When the performances of children with ASD were examined according to imitation types, it was found that they had more difficulties in spontaneous imitation skills, on the contrary, normally developing children showed similar performance in both types of imitation. Structured imitation and spontaneous imitation skills require different competencies. With structured imitation processes, the child reproduces the action he observes without any personal purpose. In cases where imitation is made and occurs at the child's own will, the child chooses one of all the behavioral models in his environment that matches his own motivation. The fact that children with ASD have more difficulty in spontaneous imitation skills than in structured imitation skills supports Quill's (2002) interpretation that children with ASD only imitate the action and have limitations in understanding the content of the action. Rogers and Pennington (1991) suggest that imitation forms the early social competence of sharing emotions and theory of mind. When babies decide what and how to imitate for communication purposes, they make choices by understanding the purpose and intention of the individuals they observe in context and interpreting the behavior. Normally developing babies do not simply reproduce the behavior they observe or the results of the behavior, they see the behavior of the observed individual as purposeful and in this process, they choose the behavior to repeat, adapt and adapt their own behavior. While modeling, they can separate the non-purposeful behaviors of the observed individual and create new behaviors for the same result. They may exhibit behaviors or they may occur by imitating the process of an incomplete behavior, the outcome of which they cannot observe. All these behaviors occur within the context of joint attention.
As a result, research shows that children with ASD perform lower in imitation skills than both normally developing children and children with developmental delays, and that the difficulties experienced by children with ASD in spontaneous imitation skills increase even more. shows. Imitation skills are one of the early social communication skills and are considered a communicative action as well as a necessary skill for social learning. The fact that imitation is an early social communication skill and its relationship with language development shows that the limitations in imitation skills in children with ASD are important for language development. The imitation problems seen in children with ASD are thought to be one of the main obstacles in the process of establishing social relationships and learning within these social relationships.
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