Children with autism spectrum disorders display deficits in joint attention, which may affect areas such as language, regulation and perspective-taking. In the recent years there has been a lot of focus on joint attention interventions for children with autism. According to Lawton and Kasari (2012) the main focus in this research has been on increasing the quantity of joint attention for young children with autism. Now Lawton and Kasari have investigated if the quantitative effect of a recent published randomized-controlled study also improved the quality of joint attention for those children.
Based on the review of these results the researchers found improvement also in the quality of joint attention, based on increases in the frequency of shared positive affect during joint attention as well as shared positive affect with utterances during joint attention. Positive affect during joint attention was understood as the child directing a smile towards the adult during joint attention.
Interventions has to target all relevant aspects of behavior, such as frequency, intensity, quality etc. It is essential with research investigating all relevant aspects.
Children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) are often reported to spend a lot of time engaged in screen based media, such as TV, computers and video games. But there are not a lot of research done in investigating this issue. Now Mazurek and colleagues have investigated this in the sample of the NAtional Longitudal Transition Study – 2. This study confirms the general perception that individuals with ASD spend more time using non-social screen media than others.
There has been a lot of stories and publicity on using iPads for persons with autism since Apple started selling this device. A lot of success stories is put out, but all such personal stories need to be supported by research in order to allow professionals and policy makers to make good decisions on implementing the use of different technologies. Now more research on the use of iPad is beefing published, and now Flores and colleagues from Auburn University have published a study comparing the use of iPad and picture based communication for children with autism.
Their study shows mixed results, but within these results there are also some promising results. It will be great to see more research on this, and maybe more research will show that the science applied to teach the communication may be more important than the actual technology.
There is strong evidence for the effectiveness of peer mediated interventions for children with autism spectrum disorders, as well as other positive not directly targeted effects of peer mediated interventions. Some parents and professionals in kindergartens and schools has raised their concern for the typical peers involved in such interventions. But now Locke, Fuller and Kasari has published a study exploring this.
Based on their study 60 children they conclude that typical peers can be socially connected to children with ASD, through intervention and outside or after intervention, as well as other classmates, and maintain a strong and positive role within the classroom.
The use of eLearning is raising in all fields, and the possibilities it gives should be desirable for applied behavior analysis, and especially for providing services and knowledge to people not abel to attend classes. And for parents of children with autism spectrum disorders this may support the access to quality training in applied behavior analysis. Jang, Dixon, Tarbox, Granspeesheh, Kornack and de Nocker have researched the effect of an eLearning program for parents of children with ASD.
Their eLearning program vas self-paced, interactive and Web-based. The program required about 30 – 40 hours to complete, and covered the central aspects of ABA for children with ASD. Based on their randomized, wait list-controlled study they found significant improvement after completing this eLearning program. This is an exiting possibility for service providers outside rural areas.
Parents are in most cases the most stable and lasting resource for persons with autism spectrum disorders (ASD). The number of parent programs available is therefor encouraging, but the effect of many of these programs are uncertain. Now Autism has published an article by Patterson, Smith and Mirenda online that provides a systematic review of training programs for parents of children with autism spectrum disorders with contributions from single subjects.
Their review indicates that several parent programs have moderate effect based on the provided data, indicating that programs may be useful in teaching parents to implement effective strategies. However there is need for more reserach to better understand how such programs may support parents in using this strategies as the child gets older in daily situations.
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The evidence of Early and Intensive Behavioral Intervention (EIBI) has been established through several studies. However is is necessary to investigate the effect of EIBI in mainstream setting. Mainstream settings as preschools and kindergarten may vary greatly among con tries and probably between districts in each country. This supports the need for several studies investigating different setting and characteristics of these settings.
Now Eikeseth, Klintwall, Jahr and Karlsson have published a study on the outcome for children with autism receiving early and intensive behavioral intervention in mainstream preschool and kindergarten setting in Research in Autism Spectrum Disorders. In this study they indlucet 35 children in the treatment group and 24 children in a comparison group. This study shows that the children in the EIBI group scored significantly higher on standard scores of adaptive behavior after one year of treatment.
Video modeling has been showed to be an effective intervention in teaching individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASD). Video modeling may be implemented by using different strategies, one of them being video self-modeling. This involves the individual themselves being the model on the video. Now Gelbar, Anderson, McCarthy and Buggey have provided å review that summarizes the empirical evidence supporting the use of video self-modeling with individuals with autism spectrum disorders. This article is published in Psycology in the Schools, Vol 49 (2012).
Based on their review of the available empirical evidence video self-modeling should be considered as part of a continuum of strategies for individuals with ASD. The heterogeneity in the ASD group implies that there are great variation in results, but video self-modeling has been used to increase language and communication, increase social skills, modify behavior, and teach functional skills.
