Internet-Based Parent-Implemented Intervention for Young Children With Autism

Abstract

Both naturalistic communication and parent-implemented interventions are evidence-based practices for young children with disabilities, but demonstrations of effective methods for teaching parents to implement naturalistic interventions successfully with their children are still warranted. The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of a training and coaching program on parent implementation of naturalistic teaching strategies and on concomitant child communication skills using a telepractice service-delivery model (i.e., Internet-Based Parent-Implemented Communication Strategies [i-PiCS]). We found that parents learned to implement the targeted naturalistic teaching strategies with fidelity when, and only when, they were provided with training and coaching over the Internet. The parents' implementation of these strategies also corresponded with positive changes in their children's communication skills. The limitations and implications of this investigation are discussed.

Understanding Communication Intervention for Young Children with Autism and Their Parents: Mixing Behavioral and Social Validity Findings

“…Contrary to these findings, when we analyzed the parents' interviews that we administered to assess their perspectives about the social validity of the i-PiCS program, both mothers reported high levels of satisfaction with the goals, procedures, and outcomes of their participation (see Meadan et al 2016). They reported high levels of satisfaction with their own growth and their children's communication progress.…”

“…Using these measures within a multiple baseline design (i.e., across strategies within each parent-child dyad), we documented changes in parent strategy use and child communication behavior (see Meadan et al 2016). One of the participating children used speech exclusively and made substantial and observable gains in his expressive language that were evident in our dependent variable measures and in formal communication assessment results.…”

“…We conducted a study to evaluate one such training and coaching program, the Internet-based Parent-implemented Communication Strategies (i-PiCS) program (Meadan et al , 2016. The three parents, all mothers, who participated in the iPiCS program received training to implement four evidence-based naturalistic teaching strategies to support their children's communication skills, including: (a) environmental arrangement, (b) modeling, (c) mand-model, and (d) time delay.…”

“…After receiving training on these strategies, an i-PiCS research team member provided coaching via videoconferencing on each of the strategies until the parents implemented the strategy with high fidelity and reported feeling confident when using the strategy with their children. (For a detailed description of the procedures, see Meadan et al 2013 andMeadan et al 2016).…”

“…We also observed variability in their mothers' use of the strategies and a decrease in their implementation during maintenance conditions (i.e., no coaching). We had assessed fidelity of implementation for both training and coaching at 100 % with 100 % interobserver agreement for both of these mothers (Meadan et al 2016).…”