Ming from Agents of Speech explains why speech-delayed two-year-olds repeat sounds without meaning. Their vocalizations are proto-words, unstable prototypes. Echolalia, parroting what they hear, is normal development, not just autism. The child says a word once or twice but can't hold it across different situations.
The link between words, the meaning and the function is very blurry. So when children at around two, they start using words, it might actually in their minds be not words. They don't know the meaning of it. They're just saying it. And what we do is like, oh.
The kids are seeing.
It at the right context. It means that they know the word. Not really. Sometimes it's what researchers are calling proto words, meaning they're prototypes of words. They're not sure what it is, they're just blurbing it out. That's number one, meaning that, oh, these words aren't really words. There are sounds that they've picked up somewhere. Second of all, is it echolalia? Echolalia doesn't mean autism, but echolalia can happen with children who aren't on the spectrum as well. It's a way of acquiring language. So when you find out that maybe he doesn't really know the word per se, so the link between the words and the meaning and the function become blurry. Therefore, they might know these words, but.
They don't know how to use it.
In different situations. That's why you see that, oh, they.
Used it once and they never said it again.
They said it a few times and then it's gone because they didn't acquire it 100%.
