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| Increasing Social Skills of Children with Autism |
| Monday, May 30, 2005 |
| 11:00 AM–11:50 AM |
| Continental B (1st floor) |
| Area: AUT |
| Chair: Mitchell T. Taubman (Autism Partnership) |
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| Establishing Humor Related Skills in Children with Autism |
| Domain: Applied Research |
| MITCHELL T. TAUBMAN (Autism Partnership), Sasha Papovich (Autism Partnership), Kanon Riecks (Autism Partnership), Juliana Luna Hernandez (Autism Partnership), Ronald Leaf (Autism Partnership), John McEachin (Autism Partnership) |
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| Abstract: There is much in the literature illustrating the difficulties experienced by individuals with autism in the social skills area. This is especially true in regard to nuanced social behavior, such as inferencing and providing and understanding humor. This study investigated the effectiveness of interventions designed to build humor related behaviors in three high functioning children with autism. All three participants were 6 years old, had a diagnosis of autism, and were placed in regular education classes. A multiple baseline design across targets was utilized. Targets included discriminating between jokes and joke-sounding, but non-humorous, material; being able to discriminate when someone is jokingly teasing; and responding to humorous story-telling with reciprocal humorous story-telling. Several behaviorally based teaching interventions were used including discrete trial teaching, teaching interactions, and group instruction. Discussion of results focuses on the complexity of the target area as well as generalization of skills within the response class. |
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| Increasing Peer Interaction in Preschoolers with Pervasive Developmental Disorder During Play Using Video Modeling and Typical Peers |
| Domain: Applied Research |
| GRETCHEN A. DITTRICH (Northeastern University) |
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| Abstract: The effects of using a video modeling procedure to increase peer interaction between preschoolers diagnosed with pervasive developmental disorder (PDD) and typical peers during play were evaluated in a classroom setting. Video models consisted of two typical age-matched peers engaging in natural, unscripted play during three play activities. The two typical peers also served as playmates for two preschoolers with PDD. During video modeling, random samples of the videos were shown to peer dyads. Dyads were then instructed to play with the same toys as seen on the video. Results demonstrated that video modeling was effective in increasing unscripted peer interaction for all participants, regardless of diagnosis, and increased peer interaction for the children with PDD to levels higher than the baseline levels of interaction for the typical peers. Results demonstrated that video modeling is an effective method of increasing unscripted peer interaction in preschoolers with PDD and typical peers. |
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