Assessment and treatment of response to name for children with autism spectrum disorder: Toward an efficient intervention model

Abstract

Response to name (RTN) is an early developmental milestone, deficits in which are associated with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). This study extends previous research by evaluating an assessment and treatment model for RTN with 13 children with ASD. For all participants, phase 1 was a naturalistic social baseline. The 9 children who did not meet mastery criteria in phase 1 underwent a series of treatment conditions in phase 2. In phase 3, treatment components were removed, and generalization was assessed. Results indicated that tangible reinforcement procedures can produce rapid increases in discriminated RTN, sometimes without prompts. The total number of trials to mastery were reduced in the current study relative to previous research. Results also provide preliminary evidence to suggest that the phase 1 baseline condition may produce distinct patterns of RTN that could be used to predict treatment effects and further reduce trials to mastery in future work.

Improving Eye Contact and Gaze Following in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Systematic Withdrawal of Stimulus Prompts and Tangible Reinforcers

“…The potential benefits of our procedures include a reduction in errors and non-responses, an increase in opportunities to obtain reinforcement, and facilitated stimulus control for eye contact. Rather than evaluating various types of prompts as was done in previous studies (e.g., Conine, Vollmer, Barlow, et al, 2020; Conine, Vollmer, & Bolívar, 2020), appropriateness of a given prompt in our study was assessed briefly before entering each training phase. The prompt assessment procedure used in our study appears to be relatively easy to use in applied settings.…”

“…If the participant did not track or did not make eye contact for 5 seconds, the instructor made no response and ended the trial. The procedure was the same as described in previous research (Conine, Vollmer, Barlow, et al, 2020; Conine, Vollmer, & Bolívar, 2020; Cook et al, 2017; Rapp et al, 2019).…”

“…Phase 3 (finger prompt): Upon delivery of the verbal antecedent, the instructor held her index finger close to the participant’s eyes, moved it slowly toward her own eyes, and continued holding her index finger close to her eyes for 5 seconds. This procedure was similar to “track fingers” described by Conine, Vollmer, Barlow, et al (2020) and Conine, Vollmer, and Bolívar (2020) . For Chen, each correct response was reinforced with social praise and a token, as he had indicated his preference for tokens at the beginning of the sessions.…”

“…An issue concerning progressive models is that the number of training phases varies across participants, and procedural modifications are sometimes required (Conine, Vollmer, Barlow, et al, 2020; Conine, Vollmer, & Bolívar, 2020; Cook et al, 2017; Rapp et al, 2019), making it difficult to assess the effectiveness of the training model in question. Relatively simple procedures requiring few minor modifications for teaching eye contact need to be developed and evaluated.…”

Video-modelling as an effective solution for coaching carers of autistic adults

“…The success criterion was set as correctly enacting a minimum of 70% of the 11-element DRS over two consecutive sessions (Conine et al , 2020; Horner and Keilitz, 1975; Lerman et al , 2015). The decision to set a relatively low criterion for success was taken by relevant parties at a multidisciplinary meeting discussing this intervention and its potential outcome.…”