Perception of Sociolinguistic Variation by Young Adults with High-Functioning Autism

The complex patterns of strengths and weaknesses of people with high-functioning autism (HFA) in a range of sociolinguistic tasks, including dialect and age classification, attitude judgments, and implicit imitation, will be described. The results demonstrate attention by participants with HFA to relevant sources of social variation, particularly with respect to age and intelligence, suggesting that social abilities in autism are gradient and reflected in language use.