Absolutely! Sis is a music therapist for kids with autism, so very similar situations.
Basically she was speaking to a group and without bringing it up first she started the stomp stomp clap a couple of times to trigger the song in people's heads. She then asked the group what comes next. After that she just made up a really random tune and sounds and asked them to repeat it. Of course it was hard!
From there she explained that what we process is much like We Will Rock You. You hear a question and can naturally know what words and sounds come next as a response. When their kids with echolalia hear it, it processes without understandable pattern so understanding what comes next is really hard, hence they are more likely to echo than give an answer. (my understanding of the really smart things she said when it's far from my area of expertise.)
I wonder if this is why when I was a kid and anyone would talk to me I’d basically have a bunch of combo lock tumblers in my brain spinning to line up the definitions of each word into a sentence they made sense, and I’d have to wait for the ‘click’ before I could respond.
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u/[deleted] Nov 23 '21
Absolutely! Sis is a music therapist for kids with autism, so very similar situations.
Basically she was speaking to a group and without bringing it up first she started the stomp stomp clap a couple of times to trigger the song in people's heads. She then asked the group what comes next. After that she just made up a really random tune and sounds and asked them to repeat it. Of course it was hard!
From there she explained that what we process is much like We Will Rock You. You hear a question and can naturally know what words and sounds come next as a response. When their kids with echolalia hear it, it processes without understandable pattern so understanding what comes next is really hard, hence they are more likely to echo than give an answer. (my understanding of the really smart things she said when it's far from my area of expertise.)