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The Facilitation of Social-Emotional Understanding and Social Interaction in High-Functioning Children with Autism: Intervention Outcomes

Nirit Bauminger, Aug 2002

Background

This study assessed and treated abnormalities in reciprocal social interaction and emotional expression and recognition in high-functioning children diagnosed with ASD. High-functioning children with ASD present difficulties with social cognition, social interaction with peers, and social-emotional intervention. Bauminger’s study aimed to increase competency in these areas, and recorded whether improvement was made in the areas of social problem solving, emotional understanding, and social interactions with peers.

Introduction

Goal:

Methods

Participants: The procedure entailed intervention by the child’s main teacher in school, a typically developing peer, and the child’s parents. Intervention with the teacher consisted of:

• Social Behavior and interaction – defining what friendship is, listening to a friend.

• Social Skills Ratings – Rates students’ overall social skills in context of cooperation, assertion, and self-control.

• Emotional Understanding – Emotion training (happy, sad, angry, afraid) through facial expressions, gestures, and vocalizations and how they are generalized to social scenarios.

• Social-interpersonal problem solving – Training on 13 social initiation contexts, such as initiating conversation with a friend.

Interventions with the teacher were 3 hours a week for 7 months, as well as practice sessions with their typically developing peer partner, and involvement from parents for motivational support.

Results

The social behavior and interaction assessment was measured with a 2x2 ANOVA (time 1/time 2 x initiating/responding). There was a significant main effect on time (F(1, 14) = 21.55; p < 0.001) and for type of behavior (F(1, 14) = 26.12; p < 0.00). Interpretation of these numbers means autistic children who underwent intervention had increased levels of initiation and positive responses to peers compared to baseline.

The social skills rating assessment was measured using a MANOVA with time (before and after intervention) vs. cooperation, assertion and self-control. Results showed a significance using F(Wilks’ criterion) (3, 12) = 13.04 and p < 0.001. Interpretation of the results shows that cooperation, assertion and self-control improved after children went through intervention.

The emotional understanding assessment was measure on three dimensions - knowledge, audience, and general vs. specific. The knowledge dimension was measured using a paired t-test analysis, and showed significance with t(14) = 4.09 and p < 0.001 for complex emotions. The audience dimension was measured with a MANOVA with repeated measures in time (before and after intervention) and showed significance with F(Wilks’ criterion (2, 13) = 41.94 and p < 0.000 for basic, complex, and overall number of emotions. The general vs. specific dimension used a MANOVA with repeated measures in time, and showed significance in basic and complex emotions with an F(Wilks’ criterion (4,11) = 20.70 and p < 0.000. This means that children who underwent this treatment had increased understanding of basic, complex and overall number of emotions compared to baseline.

In the context of the social-interpersonal problem solving assessment, a multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) with repeated measures in time (before and after intervention) was used with 8 PSM categories (activity, passivity, relevance, total number of alternative solutions provided, help content, social content, and nonsocial content). A significant effect was found for time using Wilks’ criterion (F(8, 7) = 8.24; p < 0.01^2). At follow up, ANOVA was used to measure the differences between time 1 and time 2. Compared to baseline, children who underwent intervention had increased problem-solving abilities and presented more relevant solutions to problems.

Conclusion

Discussion