Have you ever asked your child “How was your day?”, and they repeated what you said? Maybe later you heard them repeating “Cookie Monster, you knocked the tower down!” while playing with blocks, but there was no Cookie Monster in sight. You may be confused as these words may sound irrelevant to the questions or context at the moment, but they often have meaning!
Echolalia
When children repeat language like this it is called echolalia. There are mainly two types of echolalia – immediate and delayed. Immediate echolalia is when the words are repeated immediately after it is said by others. For example, you ask your child “Do you want to eat?” and they repeat your question.
Delayed echolalia can be a child using a phrase they heard hours, days or even years ago, and it can sometimes appear out of context. For example, your child plays with the train set and says “Stand clear of the doors please” because that is what they heard on the subway earlier that day. Or, your child says “Ready set go!” when they see someone playing with a ball.
Echolalia can be part of typical language development from ages 18 months to 30 months. Echolalia also tends to be more commonly seen in Autistic children. Past research estimated that 85% of Autistic children used echolalia. More recent research indicated that echolalia might be a defining characteristic in Autistic children.
Gestalt Language Processing
Children who often use delayed echolalia may be learning language through Gestalt Language Processing (GLP). This means that they often learn language in chunks (gestalts) rather than only as individual words.
Think of it as an assembled Lego set, with the example sentence “I want to go to the park”.
In neurotypical language, or Analytical Language Processing (the more traditional view of language development), children may first say single words; park. They will then combine some words: go park, want park, I go. They will then generate more complete sentences, but still miss some of the grammar: I want park, I go park. They will then finally start to add the grammar pieces: I want to go, go to the park. Children assemble a lego set piece by piece as they isolate the meaning of each word they hear.
In contrast, when children learn by “chunks”, like in GLP, the child learns about the meaning associated with the entire Lego set, instead of the individual pieces. GLP learners may repeat the entire phrase right from the start, without going through the combination steps, and they may use it to communicate different things. For example, the child says “I want to go to the park” anytime they want to go to the park, but also anytime they want to go outside. Over time, they learn to take the pieces apart and build them back up to form something new and with a more specific meaning. For example, “I want to go to the store, Let’s go to the park, etc.”. They first start from the big chunk, and then benefit from support to break it down.
Often, these gestalts are associated with a certain situation or emotion, and usually said with the exact same intonation every time. This is why they might appear out of context. For example, if a child is often told “Sit down and behave!” when they are very upset and running around the room, they might say “Sit down and behave!”, with the same intonation, in other contexts when they feel upset again, even if they are already sitting down. They might also say it when they see someone else feeling upset or crying.
Supporting All Language Learners
It’s important to know that both ways of learning language are valid and meaningful ways of communicating. GLP is not a language disorder, but just a different way of learning language. Different ways of language processing mean that different approaches should be used to facilitate language development in therapy and daily routines. Because of this, your Speech Language Pathologists and Assistants may incorporate Gestalt-based goals into your child’s therapy to help them develop language in a way that matches their style of learning.
If you have concerns about your child’s language development, contact us today for more information or to book an appointment!
Sources:
Meaningful speech- echolalia education. Meaningful Speech- Echolalia Education. (n.d.). Retrieved September 28, 2022, from https://www.meaningfulspeech.com/
American Speech-Language-Hearing Association. (n.d.). Echolalia and its role in Gestalt language acquisition. American Speech-Language-Hearing Association. Retrieved September 28, 2022, from https://www.asha.org/practice-portal/clinical-topics/autism/echolalia-and-its-role-in-gestalt-language-acquisition/
Cohn, E. et al (2022). Repeating purposefully: Empowering educators with functional communication of echolalia in Autism. Autism and Developmental Language Impairments.
https://www.theinformedslp.com/review/let-s-give-them-something-to-gestalt-about