Transitions as a Series of Sequences: Implications in Testing for and Diagnosing Autism

ABSTRACT

Children who receive a diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are said to have characteristic difficulty with transitions. However, testing that informs ASD diagnosis overlooks children’s conduct during transitions between subtasks of the test. In this article, we describe and analyze the sequential organization of such transitions. First, we show that transitions come as an organized series of sequences, which we call the Transitional Activity Series (TAS). We then show how the TAS is a contingent accomplishment with a structure that clinician and child adapt to emergent troubles in co-orientation. Lastly, we analyze how a particular child’s “rigid and repetitive behaviors,” a criterion of ASD diagnosis linked to transitional difficulty, may work to facilitate, rather than upend, transitions between discrete testing tasks. Data in American English.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

¹ For another paper in which there is a series consisting of four adjacency-pairs, although in a very different domain, see Schegloff’s (1986) discussion of the four core opening sequences in telephone calls.

² Co-orientation sequences establish not only shared attention but also a working agreement to become mutually involved in the projected activity. This bears some affinity to Kendrick and Drew’s (2016, p. 2) concept of “recruitment.”

³ See Mehan’s (1974, pp. 106–114) discussion of negotiation between child and teacher in the performance of questions and answers in the classroom.

⁴ Also consider, for example, Extract 3, where Stephen pursued an independent activity in the interlude between closure and instructions, which presented trouble for co-orientation as Melinda initiated an task-instructional sequence.

Additional information

Funding

This study was made possible by grants from the National Science Foundation (1257065). We are also grateful for support from the Waisman Center at the University of Wisconsin and its University Center for Excellence in Developmental Disabilities grant (NICHD P30 HD03352). This research was also supported by a grant to the Center for Demography of Health and Aging (P30 AG017266) at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, and by the Robert F. and Jean E. Holtz Center for Science and Technology Studies, also at the University of Wisconsin–Madison.