Nesrhtens…..

The ability to initiate and maintain conversation is one of the core impairments for persons with autism spectrum disorders, and effective teaching procedures for establishing these skills for persons with autism spectrum disorders may increase the ability to participate in social interaction and contribute an increase in the quality of life for those who learn to master the skills.

Dotson et al (2009) has investigated teaching conversational skills in a group format for adolescents on the autism spectrum using the teaching interaction procedure. This procedure involves; describing the target behavior, why the behavior should be used, when it should be used and the steps involved in the behavior. Then the teachers model the behavior, and the learner gets to role-play - rehearsal. And through the teaching process the learner receives positive feedback.

Teaching conversational skills in a group format may have several advantages as the authors points out; the possible effect of observational learning, efficiency, generalization effect of similar stimuli.

This study found that this format was effective in establishing the skills for adolescents with ASD, but none of the participants fully generalized all skills, but only partial generalization.

Reference
Dotson, W.H. et al. Group teaching of conversational skills to adolescents on the autism spectrum. Research in Autism Spectrum Disorders (2009), doi: 10.1016/j.rasd.2009.09.005

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