| Abstract: Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) often exhibit deficits in language development. While typically developing children demonstrate adult-like language production by age 5 (Luinge, Post, Wit, & Goorhuis-Brouwer, 2006), expressing abstract and hypothetical ideas across a variety of topics (Tager-Flusberg et al, 2009), children with ASD often have difficulty with more complex language that has not been directly taught. Further, studies have found that some children with autism do not combine known words at the same time as typically developing peers (Paul, Chawarska, Klin, and Volkmar, 2007; Weismer et al., 2011), pointing to a deficit in generative language. Strategies to promote the emergence of untrained verbal operants are of critical importance for learners with ASD. However, few procedures have been developed to program and test for emergence of untrained skills. Additionally, few studies have addressed remediation strategies when emergence fails to occur. The current presentation will present several lines of research focused on assessing emergence of untaught verbal behavior during treatment as well as strategies to promote emergence and generative language. Specific interventions to promote emergence of listener and tact skills as well as intraverbals will be presented. |