Animal-assisted activity improves social behaviors in psychiatrically hospitalized youth with autism

Abstract

There is preliminary research suggesting that animal-assisted activities can improve social interactions of children with autism spectrum disorder. This pilot study sought to investigate the benefits of animal-assisted activities with dogs and psychiatrically hospitalized youth with autism spectrum disorder. Participants were recruited from a specialized inpatient psychiatric hospital unit for youth with autism spectrum disorder and other developmental disabilities. Utilizing a crossover design, participants served as their own control by engaging in two 10-min conditions: an experimental dog and handler interaction (animal-assisted activities) and a novel toy and handler control (control). Of the 142 youth aged 6-–8 years screened for participation, 47 completed both conditions. Participants’ behavioral data were captured via video and coded using the Observation of Human-Animal Interaction for Research, a tool specifically developed to capture human behavioral interactions in the presence of animals. Overall, social-communication behaviors significantly improved in the animal-assisted activities experimental condition compared to the control condition ( p = 0.0001). Specifically, participants in the animal-assisted activities experimental condition displayed more positive emotional facial expressions ( p ⩽ 0.0001), talking ( p = 0.0408), use of gestures ( p = 0.032), and looking at both adults and peers ( p ⩽ 0.0001). In addition, a higher frequency of constant motion ( p = 0.003) was observed in the animal-assisted activities experimental condition. Results suggest that animal-assisted activities with a dog may promote social-communication behaviors in psychiatrically hospitalized youth with autism spectrum disorder. Given the fact that social and communication behaviors can facilitate treatment engagement for this population, we recommend future studies examine how such improvements can positively affect the psychiatric treatment of this population.

Dog training intervention improves adaptive social communication skills in young children with autism spectrum disorder: A controlled crossover study

“…However, most of these studies were limited in important ways. For instance, most of the studies examined the impact of dog interventions on child-to-dog and child-totherapist social relationships (Ávila-Álvarez et al, 2020;Germone et al, 2019), rather than of social interactions in the natural environment. Furthermore, while improvement in communication skills (verbal and non-verbal), social engagement, and language have also been reported, those findings were based on observations during the dog intervention and/or the researcher's own coding system (Fung & Leung, 2014;Redefer & Goodman, 1989;Sams et al, 2006;Silva et al, 2011), rather than via standardized measures of autism severity and adaptive skills.…”

“…The first examined 49 psychiatrically hospitalized youth with ASD, aged 6-8 years, utilizing a crossover design in which participants served as their own comparator by engaging in two 10-min-long interventions: an experimental dog and handler interaction, and a novel toy and handler control interaction. The dog-assisted activities were found to promote social communication behaviors (better positive facial expressions, gestures, talking, and eye contact) (Germone et al, 2019). The second study examined 19 children with a confirmed or probable ASD diagnosis (mean age of 46.2 months) who received a dog intervention in nine sessions of 20 min each and were assessed by measures of direct observation.…”

Programa de intervenções assistidas por animais para crianças com transtorno do espectro autista

“…The following criteria were applied for inclusion: available in full-text, research articles, and published between 2015 and 2018. Twenty-eight articles were selected for full reading, and three articles were included (Becker et al, 2017;Germone et al, 2019;Guérin et al, 2017). In order to provide support on the benefits of AAIs for children with ASD, a systematic review developed by experts in the field was selected (Haire, 2017).…”

“…The cost, ease of implementation, and characteristics of the human-animal interaction should be taken into account. The dogs were certified by internationally recognized bodies and prepared on the day of the session: they took a bath before the visit and wore an identification vest (Becker et al, 2017;Germone et al, 2019). The sessions took place every week for 12 weeks.…”

“…The session lasted 10-15 minutes every two weeks. The duration of the program was not reported (Germone et al, 2019).…”