Autism

Autism is a developmental mental impairment that affects young children in their initial 3 years of life characterized by consistent disability in social communication as well as social interaction with other people (Allman, 2010). An individual with autism usually has limited, recurring behavioral patterns, activities or interests. Long-term disabilities substantially affect a number of areas of development including; communication impairments, sensory processing impairments, social difficulty and the necessity for strict routines in their lives (Lamb, Parr, Bailey, & Monaco, 2002). Autism traits are manifested in various ways:  delayed verbal development, the desire to accomplish what they start, resistance to change in day to day routine, feeling distressed upon being touched as well as the capability of expressing emotions and the inability for the procession and responding to humor.

The cause of Autism tends to vary. It is claimed that failing to let the body to heal after one year of pregnancy can cause autism in a child (Landau, 2001). Also, it is determined that Autism is genetically hereditary. It is also identified that Iodine deficiency causes Autism. A diet containing iodine can lead to a number of negative impacts on the growing fetus including; serious mental retardation and severe IQ loss (Hess et al., 2008). A number of people believe the cause of Autism to be due to the lack of emotions, the absence of love and care towards a child. The total population of children having Autism has alleviated substantially mainly within African Americans as well as the Hispanic males per the recent research. But, there is a small population of females found with Autism.

Autism traits vary per every child because of the severity of the situation. Children tend to exhibit the autism characteristics in differing combinations and different levels of severity (Murray, 2012). One major trait is behavioral problems like aggressive or self-injuring behaviors. Actually, the child may tend to be over passive or active. They may show weird or ritualistic behaviors like swaying back and forth or wave their hands. They can also resist changing during normal routines. Atimes the child tends to possess unique talent in math, music or even art.

Parents start to notice the traits of autism when their children exhibit antisocial behaviors and other behavioral problems. Because a real test that can be used to diagnose Autism is lacking, various professional have utilized different diagnostic methods (Lord, Cook, Leventhal, & Amaral, 2013). And because a number of the traits of Autism are shared among other disabilities, tests belonging to such disabilities are undertaken to reveal those possibilities. Alternatively, children are diagnosed by a number of doctors normally consisting of a learning consultant, speech therapist, neurologist, developmental pediatrician, as well as utilization of parental input regarding the child’s behaviors and capabilities. As soon as the diagnosis is done, health professionals can assist the families in designing a precise treatment plan (Tuchman R, 2003). In essence, a treatment plan can include all or any of these; medication, behavioral modification, specialized education programs, and therapy.

Chang et al., (2016) undertook a research to investigate to test the how children with autism responded to Joint Attention Symbolic Play Engagement and Regulation (JASPER), an intervention program for children with Autism (Chang et.al, 2016). They wanted to find out how children with autism improve under this intervention program. More specifically, they aimed at determining if children whom obtained the adapted JASPER exhibited more progresses in terms of play skills, conjoint attention and conjoint engagement as compared to those in the waitlist group (Chang et al., 2016). They also wanted to determine if the children within the adapted JASPER situation were capable of demonstrating more improvements under regular language as well as cognitive tests. Additionally, they wanted to determine whether the adapted JASPER was practical and realistic in the preschool classes as well as to determine the extent that teacher provide the intervention program with commitment (Chang et al., 2016). To achieve the research objectives, they hypothesized that children acquitting the adapted JASPER would exhibit more language, cognitive as well as social communication score than children within the waitlist control group and also regarded that the teachers would retain a higher degree of implementation commitment.

In the study by Chan et al. (2016), there were 66 pre-school children having autism placed within 12 classrooms under the supervision of 12 teachers who were randomly selected to obtain instant JASPER training or were either waitlisted for approximately 3 months under a condition of monthly constant follow-up.  This criteria in which the participating children were recruited included: the children had to be identified to be having autism spectrum disorder, the children had to be between the ages of 3 and 5, and also the children had to be enrolled in one of the 6 autism specified pre-school programs that are part of ABA-based (Chang et al., 2016). For the teachers, every program had 4 adults consisting of various experts and professionals such as, behavior consultant amongst others. For their own purposes, 6 schools were merged into 3 pairs on the basis of the school’s level of ethnic minorities and population of English language learners. In the merged pairs, randomly selected into instant JASPER treatment or either into waitlist who acquired JASPER after 4 months (Chang et al., 2016). To test their intervention program they began with phase 1 which focused on consultation and coaching. Two preparation session that took 30 minutes was carried out by target teachers. An overview of JASPER techniques was presented unto them. The teachers also selected precise developmental toys to be used and as well design play spaces that would facilitate accessibility of developmentally proper toys for every group (Chang et al., 2016). In phase 2 on-site real intervention teaching sessions were offered for eight weeks that took a time period of 60 minutes maximum, but mostly 15 minutes training sessions (Chang et al., 2016). In the follow-up phase, consultations were not given to the JASPER group in the course of the four-week monitoring phase. However, for the waitlist group, they started their first phase whereby they were coach and also were given the opportunity to consult the queries they had.

In the examination of language skills complexity, the length of the utterance of the child to share as well as their impulsive utterance to request were actually coded by one, two or three words (Chang et al., 2016). In the findings, core deficits measures as well as standardized cognitive measures significantly improved for JASPER group more than for waitlisted children. However, JASPER teachers attained and sustained high fidelity (Chang et al., 2016). In essence, they concluded that teachers are capable of implementing evidence-based interventions accompanied by substantial improvements for the major discrepancies of the children having Autism.

The second study by Beaumont and Sofronoff (2008) sought to evaluate the efficacy of the new intervention program on children having autism disability. More specifically, they aimed at examining the efficacy of a certain multi-factor intervention program on Asperger Syndrome children’s social skills referred to as The Junior Detective Training Program Program (JDTP). The study was centered on developing and evaluating JDTP program in facilitating the enhancement of emotional understanding together Asperger Syndrome-children’s social skills (Beaumont R & Sofronoff K, 2008). This program was made up of 4 components which include; parent training, computer gaming, group social skills, and teacher handouts. To achieve their objectives, the study was designed in a random controlled trial, which compared the effectiveness of the eight-session social skills interventional efforts to develop maturity effects. They recruited a total of 49 people as the sample size to participate in the study with a six weeks follow-up and five months post-intervention.

To shape the study, they also hypothesized that JDTP participant children would make more achievements when it comes to parent-and teacher-report social competence incentives in post-intervention as compare to those in the waitlist (Beaumont R & Sofronoff K, 2008). Nonetheless, advancement of the social competence of the children was projected to be sustained at the sixth week and the fifth month follow up. They also hypothesized that treatment participants will exhibit more improvement on facial expression measures as well as body posture recognition such as being happy, afraid, sad or angry as compared to the waitlist group and these gains would be sustained at the sixth week follow up (Beaumont R & Sofronoff K, 2008). Treatment participants were hypothesized to show more improvements as compared to the waitlist controls for processes evaluating their knowledge on anger and anxiety management techniques. Also, they projected that the treatment effects replication to be at the time acquisition of the intervention by the waitlist group.

The method of their study was shaped by the ethical approval by Mater Children’s hospital as well as the University of Queensland (Beaumont R & Sofronoff K, 2008). The recruitment of the participants was done through a local newspaper and letters. Interested individuals were given research information sheet together with the parental consent forms. The requirements for the participants was that every participant had to be confirmed to be having Asperger Syndrome, have an IQ of 85, should be between the age of seven and a half and eleven years (Beaumont R & Sofronoff K, 2008). Participants were then randomized into the JDTP and waitlist control groups.

Comparative to the waitlist children, the program participants exhibited more gains in social skills than the intervention course as it was shown by the parent’s report trials. Also, the teacher-report information accredited implying children acquiring the intervention improved significantly in terms of social activity all through the treatment phases (Beaumont R & Sofronoff K, 2008). The treatment group participants were able to manage emotions appropriately. The JDTP seemed to be effective in improving social skills as well as emotional apprehending by children affected by Asperger Syndrome.

The two treatments had some similarities in how they treat Autism in children. Both of them recommended the use of a new group participative intervention program for treating children having Autism. In Chang et al. (2016) study he used the Joint Attention Symbolic Play Engagement and Regulation (JASPER) to demonstrate how this program treats autism in children. This program proved to treat autism as it showed improvements for the modified JASPER in terms of play skills, conjoint attention and conjoint engagement as compared to children in the waitlist. The other research by Beaumont and Sofronoff (2008) as well utilized a certain new multi-factor intervention program on children’s social abilities referred to as The Junior Detective Training Program Program (JDTP) for treating Asperger Syndrome, an Autism disorder. This program was exhibited in 4 components which include; parent training, computer gaming, group social skills, and teacher handouts. This program ultimately proved to be effective in improving social skills as well as emotional apprehending by children affected by Asperger Syndrome.

Both studies aimed at treating social skills and emotional management skills.  Both of the programs utilized in these studies were conducted in randomized groups and their treatment processes were carried out in different phases which are interactive thus improving the social skills and emotional management skills. For instance, according to Beaumont and Sofronoff (2008) study, JDTP exhibited more improvement on facial expression measures as well as body posture recognition such as being happy, afraid, sad or angry as compared to the waitlist group. Likewise to Chang et al. (2016), the core deficits measures as well as standardized cognitive measures significantly improved for JASPER group more than for waitlisted children.

However, the criteria for recruitment of children participants were different. For Chang et al. (2016), The criteria in which the participating children were recruited included: the children had to be confirmed to be suffering from Autism Spectrum Disorder, the children had to be between the ages of 3 and 5, and also the children had to be enrolled in one of the 6 autism specified pre-school programs that are part of ABA-based. For the teachers, every program had 4 adults consisting of teaching assistants and behavior consultants among other experts. On the other hand, Beaumont and Sofronoff (2008), the recruitment of the participants was done through a local newspaper and letters. Interested individuals were given research information sheet together with the parental consent forms. The requirements for the participants was that every participant had to be confirmed to be having Asperger Syndrome, have an IQ of 85, should be between the age of seven and a half and eleven years (Beaumont R & Sofronoff K, 2008).

To sum up, Autism indeed affects children’s behavior and social skills. Such impact affects children significantly that can even be lifetime impact on how they socially interact with other people and how they understand things or even fail to get to manage their emotions. Therefore, for the sake of the wellbeing of children, it is important that they should be treated. Both of the studies above have demonstrated that new intervention programs can be effective in treating autism. Intervention programs such as JASPER and JDTP should be implemented in schools to help treat children with Autism.