Hindawi Publishing Corporation Autism Research and Treatment Volume 2013, Article ID 436286, 9 pages http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2013/436286 Clinical Study Sensory Response Patterns in Nonverbal Children with ASD Elena Patten, 1 Karla K. Ausderau, 2 Linda R. Watson, 3 and Grace T. Baranek 4 1 Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders, he University of North Carolina, Greensboro, 300 Ferguson Building, Greensboro, NC 27412, USA 2 he University of Wisconsin-Madison, 3195 Medical Sciences Center, 1300 University Avenue, Madison, WI 53706, USA 3 Division of Speech & Hearing Sciences, he University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, CB No. 7190 Chapel Hill, NC 27599, USA 4 Division of Occupational Science & Occupational herapy, he University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, CB No. 7122 Chapel Hill, NC 27599, USA Correspondence should be addressed to Elena Patten; e patten@uncg.edu Received 21 February 2013; Revised 10 June 2013; Accepted 17 June 2013 Academic Editor: Herbert Roeyers Copyright © 2013 Elena Patten et al. his is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. We sought to examine concurrent and longitudinal associations between sensory response patterns (i.e., hyperresponsiveness, hyporesponsiveness, and sensory seeking) and verbal status of young children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) as a potential factor inluencing the development of verbal communication. Seventy-nine children with ASD (verbal,  = 29; nonverbal,  = 50) were assessed using cross-sectional analyses (Study 1), and 14 children with ASD (verbal, =6; nonverbal, =8) were assessed using prospective longitudinal analyses (Study 2). Data were collected regarding sensory response patterns and verbal ability. Hyporesponsiveness and sensory seeking behaviors were associated with verbal status in both cross-sectional and longitudinal analyses; nonverbal children were more likely to demonstrate higher hyporesponsive and sensory seeking patterns. Hyperresponsiveness did not signiicantly difer between verbal and nonverbal groups in either design. Sensory hyporesponsiveness and seeking behaviors may be important factors hindering the development of functional verbal communication in children with ASD. Unusual sensory responsiveness can oten be observed before the onset of speech and may yield important prognostic capabilities as well as inform early interventions targeting verbal communication or alternative communication options in young children with ASD. 1. Introduction Approximately 25–50% of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) do not develop functional verbal commu- nication [1–3], and functional verbal communication rarely develops ater age of ive in children with ASD [4]. hese nonverbal children have signiicantly poorer outcomes com- pared to children with ASD who do develop functional verbal communication; development of speech prior to this age predicts educational achievement, employment, the ability to live independently, and social relationships [5, 6]. Variability exists regarding terminology deining expressive communi- cation in children with ASD, particularly regarding the term “functional verbal communication” [7]. For purposes of this paper, we conceptualize functional verbal communication based on discussions by Baghdadli et al. [1] and Tager- Flusberg et al. [7] as spoken language that is spontaneous and meaningful and includes multiword utterances. Although nonverbal children with ASD comprise a sub- stantial portion of the population and outcomes are poor for them, limited research elucidating potential explanatory factors for the failure of some children with ASD to acquire meaningful expressive language or examining treatments that may improve long-term outcomes is available for individuals who remain nonverbal into the school-age years. To address this issue, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) conducted a workshop to discuss the state of the science and to generate research priorities regarding nonverbal children with ASD [8]. One research priority identiied by participants in this workshop was to identify mechanisms underlying the lack of