A randomized control study was conducted to evaluate Responsive Teaching (RT) with a sample of 15 Turkish preschool-aged children with Down syndrome (DS) and their mothers over a six-month period of time. RT is an early intervention curriculum that attempts to promote children's development by encouraging parents to engage in highly responsive interactions with them. Subjects were randomly assigned to treatment conditions: the control group consisted of standard preschool classroom services; the RT group received bi-weekly RT parent-child sessions in addition to standard services. RT mothers made significantly greater increases in their Responsiveness and Affect as wellas decreases in Directiveness than control group mothers. There were also significant group differences in children's interactive engagement and development. Children in the RT group improved their developmental quotient scores by an average of 47% compared to 7% for children in the control group. Results are described in terms of the effects of parental responsive interaction on the developmental functioning of children with DS.

A randomized control study was conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of responsive teaching (RT) with a sample of 19 Turkish preschool-age children with disabilities and their mothers over a 6-months period. RT is an early intervention curriculum that attempts to promote children's development by encouraging parents to engage in highly responsive interactions with them. Participants were randomly assigned to treatment conditions: The control group consisted of standard preschool classroom services and the RT group received biweekly RT parent-child sessions in addition to standard services. Compared with the control group, RT mothers made significantly greater increases in Responsiveness and Affect, whereas their children made greater changes in their engagement or pivotal behavior. There were also significant group differences in children's developmental outcomes. Children in the RT group improved their developmental quotient scores by an average of 42% compared with 7% for children in the control group.

Mediational analyses were conducted with data from two small randomized control trials of the Responsive Teaching (RT) parent-mediated developmental intervention which used nearly identical intervention and control procedures. The purpose of these analyses was to determine whether or how the changes in maternal responsiveness and children's engagement that occurred during these interventions contributed to child development outcomes. To conduct these analyses, regression procedures described by Baron and Kenny were used to test for mediation. RT, which focuses on enhancing mother's responsiveness with their children, was found to be more effective than the control condition at promoting not only children's development but also both mothers' responsiveness and children's engagement (i.e., pivotal behavior). Intervention changes in mothers' responsiveness were highly associated with changes in children's pivotal behavior. However, intervention changes in children's language and personal social development were mediated by changes in children's pivotal behavior but not by changes in mothers' responsiveness. Results are discussed in terms of both mechanisms for developmental change and the nature of children's early intervention objectives.