Claire Heigl Maza

Background: Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by a lack of social communication and use of restricted, repetitive behaviors. ² Children with ASD often suffer from speech and language delays including difficulty in recognizing emotions from verbal stimuli. While treatments and interventions used in children with ASD are often successful, the neurologic component of the disorder often presents challenges. ^{2, 5}  In fact, speech therapy has been shown to improve single-word acquisition and simple sentence structure, but has shown no effects on complex language thus far.¹⁰ A significant amount of research has focused on the relationship between visual processing deficits and deficits in emotional prosody in children with ASD, and very little research has focused on whether there is an auditory component to these children’s deficits in emotional processing.⁴

Objective: This review investigates whether the use of music therapy in children with ASD may be beneficial in developing spoken language and social communication skills.

Search Methods: A database search in PubMed was performed for relationships among the keywords “autism spectrum disorder,” “ASD,” “speech therapy,” “music therapy” and “child,” with exclusion criteria of studies published more than five years prior to this review.

Results:  Social communication impairments in children with ASD have been linked to reduced activity in the temporoparietal junction (TPJ) during processing of both happy and sad emotional prosody stimuli.⁴ Children with ASD also showed atypical connectivity between the voice-sensitive auditory cortex and the bilateral TPJ during emotional prosody processing.⁴ This highlights the importance of focusing on vocal cues to help children with ASD build social connections.⁴ One promising approach is Auditory-Motor Mapping Training (AMMT). AMMT uses singing and drumming exercises to improve speech.¹ A recent study shows that AMMT is particularly helpful in improving joint engagement and social communication in children with ASD who have limited spoken language compared to autistic children with stronger spoken language ability.⁶ Another study demonstrated that the children who received AMMT demonstrated greater improvement in % of correct syllables and vowels compared to the control group who received speech repetition therapy.¹ Interestingly, a study also compared music therapy, where the child actively participates with instruments, to simply listening to music.⁹ Results showed that children who participated in music therapy showed greater improvements in overall clinical functioning via the clinical global impressions scale.⁹ Combining dance therapy (DT) with music therapy (MT) showed significant improvements in social communication skills in children with ASD compared to those who made no changes to their current intervention.⁸ Parents also reported being happier with their child’s social communication abilities after the intervention.⁸

Conclusions:  Music-mediated interventions via AMMT, music listening, and dancing show promise in improving spoken language ability and social communication in children with autism. Considerations of utilizing the auditory cortex as a target for interventions for children with ASD could lead to new and effective methods of improving their language and social communication skills.

Works Cited:

1. Chenausky KV, Norton AC, Tager-Flusberg H, Schlaug G. Auditory-motor mapping training: Testing an intonation-based spoken language treatment for minimally verbal children with autism spectrum disorder. Ann N Y Acad Sci. 2022;1515(1):266-275. doi:10.1111/nyas.14817
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