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Social Communication Interventions

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Book cover Prelinguistic and Minimally Verbal Communicators on the Autism Spectrum

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Abstract

Initiations of social communication skills, including prelinguistic and spoken behavior to share and to request, are a core challenge for children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Prelinguistic behaviors including eye contact and gestures to request and to share (joint attention) are strongly associated with later language growth and, therefore, are a critical focus for children who are pre- or minimally verbal. Forty-one studies including randomized controlled trials (RCTs) and single-case designs (SCDs) examining social communication skills are reviewed in this chapter. On average, both RCTs and SCDs were of “moderate” methodological quality using published metrics for rating internal validity. Additional criteria to examine the external validity of the studies were also applied. Advances in external validity included specific recruitment of populations less frequently examined in research, delivery of intervention in community settings, and emergence of long-term follow-up studies. The studies were limited by assessment and reporting of composite social communication outcomes. Collapsing outcomes across behavioral form and function occludes understanding of which specific behaviors are changing over time. In studies in which outcomes are collapsed, lower level or simpler skills (e.g., responding to joint attention, eye contact to request) may drive change in overall outcome scores. Detailed examination of changes in specific social communication behaviors will promote better understanding of the influence of different interventions on child outcomes.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    *Indicates articles included in the review.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA, USA

    Stephanie Shire & Connie Kasari

  2. Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA

    Ann P. Kaiser & Elizabeth Fuller

Authors
  1. Stephanie Shire
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  2. Connie Kasari
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  3. Ann P. Kaiser
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  4. Elizabeth Fuller
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Stephanie Shire .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Schl of Educational and Profess Studies, Griffith University, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia

    Deb Keen

  2. Department of Special Education, University of Illinois, Champaign, Illinois, USA

    Hedda Meadan

  3. University of Kansas, Department of Speech Language Hearing Sc, Lawrence, Kansas, USA

    Nancy C. Brady

  4. Department of Special Education, University of Illinois, Champaign, Illinois, USA

    James W. Halle

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Shire, S., Kasari, C., Kaiser, A.P., Fuller, E. (2016). Social Communication Interventions. In: Keen, D., Meadan, H., Brady, N., Halle, J. (eds) Prelinguistic and Minimally Verbal Communicators on the Autism Spectrum. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-0713-2_8

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