”Preschool-based social communication treatment for children with autism: 12-month follow-up of a randomized trial”.

The purpose of the study is to examine the long-term effect of a preschool-based social communication intervention used in the pedagogical efforts aimed at 61 children with an autism spectrum disorder. The intention behind the intervention is to prolong the children’s joint engagement in the preschool setting as well as strengthen the children’s initiation of joint attention in the preschool setting.

Compared with the control group, the children in the intervention group significantly improved their attention and joint engagement from baseline to 12 months after the intervention. However, no significant effect was seen on the children’s language development, social functioning or social communication. The effect of the intervention on the children’s ability to initiate joint engagement was greater for the children who scored higher with regard to sociability at baseline; that is, the more social the child is before the intervention, the greater the effect of the intervention. The children’s IQ and language development did not have any effect on the outcome as such; that is, there was no difference between the effect on children with a high IQ or on children with a low IQ, or between children with poor or good language development.

The article describes a random sampling trial in which 61 children aged between 2 and 5 diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder were randomly divided into a control group (27 children) and an intervention group (34 children). The intervention group was exposed to a social communication intervention in addition to their normal activities in the preschool, whereas the control group only participated in their regular activities in the preschool.

Both the children in the intervention group and the children in the control group participated in systematic training activities aimed at their communication skills as well as their social and adaptive skills. The intervention group received six hours of didactic training under the supervision of a preschool teacher. The teacher worked with the children for a period of eight weeks, with two daily 20-minute sessions divided into 5-minute table-top training sessions and 15 minutes of floor play. During the table-top training activities, the teacher offers the child a toy and manages the interaction, whereas during the floor-play activities, the child takes the lead.

Video footage of the child-teacher and child-mother interaction was used to measure the child’s focus and joint engagement. This footage was coded by research assistants who had no previous knowledge about which children were in the intervention group and which were in the control group. Three measurement instruments, the Early Social Communication Scales, the Reynell Developmental Language Scale, and the Social Communication Questionnaire, were used to assess the effect of the intervention on the children with regard to communication, language and social functioning at baseline, at the end of the intervention, and 6-12 months after the intervention ended. The article reports the results from a 12-month follow-up. The video footage was coded, and data was subsequently analysed using statistical analysis (linear regression models).

Kaale, A., Fagerland, M., Martinsen, E., Smith, L. (2014). ”Preschool-based social communication treatment for children with autism: 12-month follow-up of a randomized trial”. Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 53(2), 188-198.