Investigation of the Relationship between Semantic Information and Verbal Working Memory in Children with Typical Developing, Down Syndrome and Autism Spectrum Disorder

The aim of this study is to investigate the relationship between semantic knowledge and verbal working memory (VWM) in children with typical development (TD), Down syndrome (DS) autism spectrum disorder (ASD).Descriptive research relational methods were used design research.Children group matched Raven Colored Progressive Matrices Test according their non-verbal intelligence score.The consisted 17 TD aged 4-5 years 14 DS 15 ASD whose nonverbal ages are years.Semantic was evaluated dimensions vocabulary breath depth.The language sample collected narrative context evaluate breath. Vocabulary Depth (VDT) assess depth.VWM assessed Nonsense Word Repetition (NWR).The results revealed that all groups showed significant differences breadth, depth VWM performances.It found there a positive groups.VMW predicted breadth DS.Vocabulary predict ASD.However, VMW did not ASD.The obtained from show differ two different diagnostic groups.While discussed regarding contribution acquisition DS, importance word width discussed. In addition, it has been suggested examine variables may be effective both groups.