Social Communication Deficits include
- impairments in joint attention
- Impairments in social reciprocity
- Challenges in the use of verbal & nonverbal communicative behaviors for social interaction.
Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is
a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by deficits in social communication & social interaction and the presence of restricted, repetitive behaviors.
Types of play include:
Use symbolic play- object is something else
Use functional play- use toys and objects as made
Use parallel play- play among kids but not with them
Associative play- play that's loosely organized on shared interests or materials
Cooperative- highest level, sustained and complex; common goals
Young kids: solitary play and decreased interest in developing friendships or interacting with peers
Older kids: lack of social conventions that hinders relationship development; continued solitary activities
Other characteristics: lack of social reciprocity, lack of spontaneous seeking to share enjoyment/interests, failure to develop appropriate peer relationships, impairment in nonverbal communication
Prognosis: social skills emerge slowly over time with support and intervention; social interaction occurs less frequently and may remain somewhat impaired and highly challenging throughout life; achievement in social-emotional dev. and attainment of key social skills have been identified as 2 of the strongest predictors of dev. outcomes for people with ASD
Pretend play and creativity is limited
Children are isolated and exhibit repetitive actions on objects with few variations (lack of flexibility)
Less play overall and less elaborate
Babies - The First Year
After 6 months
The core features of ASD include
(a) impairments in social communication, language, and related cognitive skills and behavioral and emotional regulation and (b) the presence of restricted, repetitive behaviors.
Common Reception and Processing Problems
Trouble controlling attention on one thing
Gestalt processing - holistic, one thing, big chunks
4. Information is not retrieved in the correct sequence
5. Time concepts and time perception are impaired
6. Language is understood and used literally
7. Auditory info is not processed efficiently or reliably
8. Meaning is not automatically attached to visual info
9. The individual is unable to solve problems and generate new or alternative solutions to fit varied or changing situations.
10. The individual is unable to totally and automatically control motor responses. Motor response problems include
CAS co-occurs with ASD
11. The individual is unable to understand the perspective of others, that people have different perspectives= Theory of Mind, which is a core deficit
The three parts of autism that help with a differential diagnoses include:
1) communication 2) social skills 3) repetitive/stereotypical behaviors.
Boys or girls typically have more ASD diagnosis?
4.5 times more common in boys than girls
12-15 Months and 2-3 years
2-3 years
20 Red Flags for ASD include
Systematic Observation of Red Flags
1. Inappropriate gaze (no eye contact; but can be cultural sometimes)
2. Lack of warm, joyful expressions (don’t hug parents, don’t touch people, frown, flat affect, don’t smile)
3. Lack of sharing interests (no joint attention)
4. Lack of response to contextual cues (unaware of context; only focused on one thing)
5. Lack of response to name
6. Lack of coordination of nonverbal communication (no pointing)
7. Repetitive movements with objects
8. Repetitive movements or body posturing
9. Lack of playing with variety of toys
10. Unusual sensory exploration
11. Excessive interest in particular toys
12. Lack of showing (they don’t get other people’s attention and interest in what they are doing)
13. Lack of pointing
14. Unusual prosody
15. Lack of communicative consonants
16. Using person’s hand as a tool
17. Distress over removing objects
18. Difficulty calming when distressed
19. Abrupt shift in emotional states
20. Unresponsive to interactions
Higher - Level Challenges include
Why the increase in ASD?
Person centered planning (PCP)
Plan for the future (careers, volunteering); what to do after H.S.; have to start thinking about this at 15, but why not start earlier
Get the family and the individual with ASD involved
Developmental DIfferences in Meaning and Use:
a)Everything/everybody has a name/label.
b)Things can have multiple labels.
c)Words can have multiple meanings.
d)Context can change meanings of words.
e)Intonation/inflection can change meaning.
Common Abilities include
Common Abilities
Advance Social Skills:
1.Understand the perspective of others (which may be different from their own perspective)
2.Identify & make sense of social info
3.Generate or formulate an appropriate response
4. Exhibit social judgment
Effects of These Deficits:
Social rules learned rigidly & inflexibly (difficult to adapt to change)
Public behavior tends to be the same as private behavior
Conventional behavior may seem startling
Inability to manage free time
Tend to focus on irrelevant info in group activities
Misunderstand humor and jokes
Theory of Mind is
The perspective of others, which shapes our behavior & actions. The sense of perspectiveteaches: what I see vs. what others see; what I know vs. what others know; what we feel & believe; what the group thinks; what other people know about other people. .
Theory of mind and deficits:
Ask yourself, can this child…
Predict behavior
Infer mental states
Adjust own behavior to compensate
Est. joint attention
Take turns
Play symbolically
Recognize and understand emotions
Use pragmatic language skills
Recognize character goals in stories
Recognize false beliefs
Understand deceptions
The World Health Organization (WHO) denotes three dimensions of disabilities
1) Impairment - what are they having trouble with
2) Activity - what activities in real life does the child want to participate in or makes up their day, part of being functional.
3) Participation - how do you modify in activities and provide support
3 Communication Intentions of Infants
Social exchanges- how to learn turn taking, you can affect others behavior by what you do; learn prediction (if I do X, mom will do Y)
Common Attributes include
Know true feelings
Tell you what they think
Straight forward
Not motivated by others impressions
Common communication and overall deficits include
4 broad behavior concepts of ASD include:
Behavior is communication. It’s a logical response to a current situation and an effort to regulate conditions that do not match need (ex. Hungry baby cries for food)
Behavior is a logical response to the environment in which the behavior was first learned. Find the why of the behavior
Behavior is an attempt by the brain to keep itself stimulated or in equilibrium (ex. Hand flapping)
Behavior is an outward expression of an inward state
IDEA
Individuals with Disabilities Education Act
Public schools must identify students with disabilities
Schools must provide FAPE with highly qualified teachers for ages 0-21
What’s different in ASD?
Early vs. late onset?
Common Sentence Forms include
(Stored as chunks without analysis for meaning.)
Echolalia can be
Immediate - you say then say right back
Delayed - repeated at some point (quoting a movie), ex. After 5 min. Or 1 week later
Mitigated - immediate or delay but reflects some variation of the original; indicates understanding