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Although theory of mind (ToM) is seen as a primary contributor to pragmatic language use in autistic individuals, less work has considered the influence of structural language. This study examines grammaticality judgements, ToM (Reading the Eyes in the Mind, Social Attribution Test), and pragmatic language (a de novo measure based on Pragmatic Language Scales), and their associations, in three groups with heterogenous abilities: Current autism (n = 36); those with a history of autism spectrum disorder, who no longer display symptoms ( “loss of autism diagnosis”, LAD; n = 32), and non-autistic (n = 36) adolescents and adults with fluent verbal skills. Results showed pragmatic difficulties in autism, relative to both other groups, difficulties in affective ToM relative to both other groups, and difficulties in structural language relative to neurotypical controls; LAD individuals showed no impairments. While pairwise associations of structural language and matrix reasoning with pragmatic language were observed, ToM was the only unique predictor of pragmatic language when all measures were included in the models. Results suggest complex interactions among pragmatic and structural language, and ToM, and that pragmatic language improves meaningfully with broad changes in broad aspects of autism when individuals lose the autism diagnosis. 

Some autistic children acquire foreign languages from exposure to screens. Such Unexpected Bilingualism (UB) is therefore not driven by social interaction; rather, language acquisition appears to rely on less socially mediated learning and other cognitive processes. We hypothesize that UB children may rely on other cues, such as acoustic cues, of the linguistic input. Previous research indicates enhanced pitch processing in some autistic children, often associated with language delays and difficulties in forming stable phonological categories due to sensitivity to subtle linguistic variations. We propose that repetitive screen-based input simplifies linguistic complexity, allowing focus on individual cues. This study hypothesizes that autistic UB children exhibit superior pitch discrimination compared to both autistic and non-autistic peers. From a sample of 46 autistic French-speaking children aged 9 to 16, 12 were considered as UB. These children, along with 45 non-autistic children, participated in a two-alternative forced-choice pitch discrimination task. They listened to pairs of pure tones, 50% of which differed by 3% (easy), 2% (medium), or 1% (hard). A stringent comparison of performance revealed that only the autistic UB group performed above chance for tone pairs that differed, across all conditions. This group demonstrated superior pitch discrimination relative to autistic and non-autistic peers. This study establishes the phenomenon of UB in autism and provides evidence for enhanced pitch discrimination in this group. Acute perception of auditory information, combined with repeated language content, may facilitate UB children's focus on phonetic features, and help acquire a language with no communicative support or motivation.