Increasing Autism Awareness in Inner-City Churches: A Brief Report

Parenting African American Children With Autism: The Influence of Respect and Faith in Mother, Father, Single-, and Two-Parent Care

“…A strong faith in God and religion has been an important aspect of child-raising among African American families (Martin, 2001;McAdoo, 2007). Most families believed that caring for their child led to increased spiritual growth and as with other research with African Americans, families in this study managed by seeking out indigenous supports in their church or the extended family (Anthony, Johnson, & Cook, 2010;Bagley & Carroll, 1998;Johnson & Van Hecke, 2015;Martin & McAdoo, 2007).…”

An international review of autism knowledge assessment measures

“…Internal consistency scores were the most commonly reported type of reliability (Bakare et al, 2008; Campbell and Barger, 2011; Campbell et al, 1996; Furnham and Buck, 2003; Garg et al, 2014; Gillespie-Lynch et al, 2015; Haimour and Obaidat, 2013; Johnson and Van Hecke, 2015; Kuhn and Carter, 2006; Mavropoulou and Sideridis, 2014; Obeid et al, 2015; Ross and Cuskelly, 2006; Segall and Campbell, 2012, 2014; Talib and Paulson, 2015), with some studies also reporting test–retest reliability (Al-Sharbati et al, 2015; Bakare et al, 2008; Vijayarani, 2014) or inter-rater reliability (Al-Sharbati et al, 2015). Occasionally, studies reported measure construct validity (e.g.…”

Optimizing Outcome in Autism Spectrum Disorders

“…The average age of detection and diagnosis of ASD in the United States is still around age 4, and systematically later in children from minority or low-SES families (Mandell, Novak, & Zubritsky, 2005). African American children receive an accurate ASD diagnosis about 2 years later than White children and often get a different diagnosis (such as ID or behavior disorder) first (N. Johnson & Van Hecke, 2015). Latino parents reported a slow, uncomfortable diagnostic process, as well as poor access to care and lack of empowerment to take advantage of services (Zuckerman et al, 2014).…”

“…Reaching these children requires increased awareness of early detection and EI in community settings. For example, successful training of health ambassadors in churches improves their knowledge of autism screening, ability to discuss autism with parents, and knowledge of referral resources (N. Johnson & Van Hecke, 2015). Allied health professionals-such as speech/language therapists, occupational therapists, and physical therapists, who might see children referred for language or motor delays-expressed interest in learning more about screening (Self, Coufal, & Parham, 2010).…”