Brief Report: Caregiver Strategy Implementation-Advancing Spoken Communication in Children Who are Minimally Verbal

Stephanie Y Shire; Wendy Shih; Connie Kasari

doi:10.1007/s10803-017-3454-0

Brief Report: Caregiver Strategy Implementation-Advancing Spoken Communication in Children Who are Minimally Verbal

J Autism Dev Disord. 2018 Apr;48(4):1228-1234. doi: 10.1007/s10803-017-3454-0.

Authors

Stephanie Y Shire¹, Wendy Shih², Connie Kasari²

Affiliations

¹ Special Education and Clinical Sciences, University of Oregon, HEDCO Education Building 5261 University of Oregon, Eugene, OR, 97403, USA. sshire@uoregon.edu.
² Center for Autism Research and Treatment, University of California Los Angeles, 68-268 760 Westwood Plaza, Los Angeles, CA, 90024, USA.

PMID: 29313178
DOI: 10.1007/s10803-017-3454-0

Abstract

Research has demonstrated that caregivers' use of intervention strategies can support their children's social engagement and communication. However, it is not clear to what degree caregivers must master the strategies to effectively support gains in social communication, specifically, core challenges such as joint attention language (comments). Twenty-two minimally verbal school-age children with autism received a social communication intervention with caregiver coaching. Through 10 min caregiver-child play interactions at eight time points, significant increase were found in children's spontaneous language. Further, children's spontaneous language was associated with caregivers' implementation. Minimum benchmarks for caregivers' total intervention implementation are discussed.

Keywords: Caregivers; Intervention; JASPER; Minimally verbal; School-age; Social communication.

MeSH terms

Attention
Autistic Disorder / psychology
Autistic Disorder / therapy*
Caregivers / psychology*
Child
Child Language
Child, Preschool
Communication*
Female
Humans
Male
Play Therapy / methods*
Social Participation*
Treatment Outcome

Abstract

MeSH terms

Grants and funding