Individuals with ADHD may experience speech and language difficulties. These may include echolalia, or the repeating of words or phrases spoken by others. While echolalia is more common in individuals with ASD, it can also occur in those with ADHD.
Echolalia means that your child is repeating what they hear in an automatic way. It is a behavior of children who are presenting as being on the autism spectrum, but it doesn't always mean that your child has Autism Spectrum Disorder.
Echolalia is a normal part of speech and language development. It improves over the first two years of life. Pathological echolalia persists beyond the age of 3 years. Echolalia is a salient speech disturbance characteristically described in children with autism.
Echolalia is commonly seen in children with developmental disorders such as autism and Tourette syndrome, however, it can also be seen in adults with medical comorbidities, such as delirium, dementia, stroke, and encephalitis.
Children with ADHD often have difficulty paying attention to the same thing for too long, and they may get distracted easily. Autistic children may have a limited scope of interest. They may seem to obsess over things that they enjoy and have difficulty focusing on things that they have no interest in.
Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and autism can look a lot alike. Children with either one can be very active and impulsive, and can have trouble focusing and interacting with other people. In fact, it can be hard to tell the difference between the two.
Stimming can take many different forms: visual: staring off into space, drawing, spinning things like pens or coins. verbal/auditory: repeating sounds, excessive giggling, constantly clearing throat. tactile: rubbing fingers, chewing/biting nails, chewing the inside of cheeks.
Individuals with ADHD may experience speech and language difficulties. These may include echolalia, or the repeating of words or phrases spoken by others. While echolalia is more common in individuals with ASD, it can also occur in those with ADHD.
People with echolalia "echo" or repeat words, sounds, or phrases. Sometimes the repeated words have no meaning, but they are often used to communicate. Echolalia can be disturbing to listeners because it sounds strange, but in itself, it is not harmful or dangerous.
Echolalia can be a problem if it continues in children older than 3. It can happen in children with autism spectrum disorders like Asperger's syndrome. They may need extra time to process the world around them and what people say to them. This causes them to copy or repeat the sounds or words they hear.
Developmental echolalia typically ends around three years old as your child learns to string words and phrases together on their own to communicate. However, if your child continues repeating words and phrases after the toddler years, it could signify that your child has autism.
In non-interactive echolalia, the child isn't trying to speak to anyone else. They might be repeating words or phrases to themselves for their own purposes—for example, to "practice" an idea or as a calming mechanism. The repetition could be stimming, but it may have no meaning at all.
Many children on the autism spectrum use echolalia, which means they repeat others' words or sentences. They might repeat the words of familiar people (parents, teachers), or they might repeat sentences from their favourite video. When children repeat words right after they hear them, it's known as immediate echolalia.
Language Development
In typically developing children, echolalia peaks at 30 months and fades by the time the child is 3 years old. Often echolalia is a developmental step in an autistic child's language and cognitive development; about 75% of children with ASD exhibit echolalia [NIH].
Repetitive behaviour
For example, children might: make repetitive noises like grunts, throat-clearing or squealing. do repetitive movements like body-rocking or hand-flapping. do things like flicking a light switch repeatedly.
People with ADHD tend to talk — a lot. We talk because we're excited or nervous, or because we just want to be a part of the conversation. Sometimes we talk simply to fill the silence because silence is hard for us.
Excessive talking is a common symptom for kids with ADHD (attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder), who often have trouble inhibiting and controlling their responses. 1 They may blurt out whatever first comes to mind, whether appropriate or not, without thinking through how their words may be received.
Hallmarks of autism spectrum disorder and ADHD often overlap. Many autistic children also have symptoms of ADHD — difficulty settling down, social awkwardness, only focusing only on things of interest to them, and impulsivity.
Mild autism is level 1 autism spectrum disorder. It means a person does not have severe symptoms and needs a lower level of support than someone else with autism. People with mild autism still have a hard time communicating and interacting with others.
Overstimulation is not only a symptom of ADHD; it's often seen in autistic people as well. People with ADHD and autistic people may display similar signs of hyperactivity when overstimulated, such as being extra reactive to sensory input (i.e., becoming fascinated by a specific object or fixating on a sensation).
People with the BAP have some traits common to autism spectrum disorder (ASD), but not enough to have the disorder. But it's not comedians who have drawn scientific scrutiny for having the BAP: it's the parents and siblings of people who actually have autism.
Scripting is the repetition of words, phrases, or sounds from other people's speech. Most commonly scripting phrases and sounds are from movies, tv, or other sources like books or people they interact with. Scripting is especially common in children on the spectrum who are learning to talk.
In general, children with Asperger's Syndrome “have more” than most children with ADHD. They have more perseveration, more stereotypies, more splinter skills, more trouble telling a coherent story, and more neuro-integrative problems.
By three years of age, you should see pretty minimal echolalia. 3-year-olds should be creating their own simple sentences to communicate with the world around them. You may still see a little echolalia here and there but the child's speech should be predominantly their own thoughts.