Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) reportedly have difficulties in responding to bids for joint attention, notably in following pointing gestures. Previous studies have predominantly built on structured observation measures and predefined coding categories to measure children’s responsiveness to gestures. However, how these gestures are designed and what detailed interactional work they can accomplish have received less attention. In this paper, we use a multimodal approach to conversation analysis (CA) to investigate how educators design their use of pointing in interactions involving school-aged children with ASD or autistic features. The analysis shows that pointing had specific sequential implications for the children beyond mere attention sharing. Occasionally, the co-occurring talk and pointing led to ambiguities when a child was interpreting their interactional connotations, specifically when the pointing gesture lacked salience. The study demonstrates that the CA approach can increase understanding of how to facilitate the establishment of joint attention.

中文翻译：

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在涉及自闭症谱系障碍儿童的互动中通过突出指向促进共同注意

据报道，患有自闭症谱系障碍 (ASD) 的儿童在回应共同注意的请求时有困难，特别是在遵循指示手势方面。以前的研究主要建立在结构化的观察措施和预定义的编码类别上，以测量儿童对手势的反应。然而，这些手势是如何设计的，以及它们可以完成哪些详细的交互工作，却很少受到关注。在本文中，我们使用对话分析 (CA) 的多模态方法来研究教育工作者如何设计他们在涉及患有 ASD 或自闭症特征的学龄儿童的互动中使用指向。分析表明，除了单纯的注意力分享之外，指向对儿童还有特定的连续影响。偶尔，当孩子解释他们的互动内涵时，特别是当指向手势缺乏显着性时，同时发生的谈话和指向会导致歧义。该研究表明，CA 方法可以增加对如何促进建立联合注意力的理解。