NCT06332144Completed
Predicting Language and Literacy Growth in Children With ASD Using Statistical Learning
Source: ClinicalTrials.gov · Last updated 22 Dec 2025
Brief summary (registry, in English)
The goal of this observational study is to test a reciprocal relationship between statistical learning and the development of language and literacy in first-graders with autism and their non-autistic peers. The main questions it aims to answer are: 1. whether children's statistical learning abilities can predict their long-term improvement of language and literacy skills in school; 2. how children's brains automatically learn patterns from speech and prints; 3. whether children's learning in the lab reflects the language patterns they have learned over the years from their native language. First-grade students will participate in the study twice across three months. During Time 1, children will complete * a battery of language, reading, and cognitive assessments * a series of computer-based statistical learning games both inside and outside of functional MRI scanner. During Time 2, children will complete a battery of language and reading assessments to detect the growth in three months. Researchers will compare the autistic and the non-autistic groups to see if statistical learning plays a similar or different role in predicting children's language and literacy growth.
- Status (registry)
- Completed
- Study type
- Interventional
- Enrollment
- 41 (actual)
- First submitted
- 5 Mar 2024
- Start date
- 13 Jan 2024
- Primary completion date
- 31 Aug 2025
- Lead sponsor
- Northeastern University
- Diseases
- Autism
- NCT number
- NCT06332144
What you commit to
- Study type: Interventional
- Participants enrolled: 41
- From 13 Jan 2024 to the primary completion date, 31 Aug 2025
- 2 sites in 1 country
- Visits and tests: ask the trial team, the registry does not list them
Built from the registry fields of ClinicalTrials.gov. It describes the study, not your situation.
Who cannot take part
Copied verbatim from ClinicalTrials.gov and grouped by topic. Only the trial team decides who can take part.
Prior treatment
- history of prior neurosurgical procedure
Other illness
- history of brain injuries and head injuries
- intellectual disability, mutism, motor delay, or developmental coordination disorder
Other
- non-native speakers of English
- More than 30 hours of exposure to a language other than English per week
- metal in body
- claustrophobic
- substance abuse
- signs of increased intracranial pressure
Who the study is looking for
- current first grader (6;0 - 7;6)
- Geographically located within the Greater Boston Metropolitan Area
- Native English speakers
- Normal hearing
- Normal or corrected vision
- Children with a professional diagnosis of autism according to expert clinical judgment
- Capable of speaking sentences with three or more words
- Social Communication Parent Questionnaire score \> 15
- Autism diagnosis confirmed by ADOS
- Neurotypical: with no known cognitive, neurological, or psychiatric disorders
- Social Communication Parent Questionnaire score \< 11
- Receive a score within 1 SD of the population mean for age on all assessments.
Age in the registry: 72 months to 90 months · Sex: All · Accepts healthy volunteers
Sites (2)
Sites in registry order. Pick your city on the disease page to sort them by distance.
| Site | City | Country | Site status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Boston University Coordinator of this site? Confirm its status | Boston | United States | Unknown status |
| Northeastern University Coordinator of this site? Confirm its status | Boston | United States | Unknown status |
This page is information, not medical advice. Discuss any trial with your doctor.