Brief Report: Pilot Randomized Controlled Trial of Reciprocal Imitation Training for Teaching Elicited and Spontaneous Imitation to Children with Autism

Abstract

Children with autism exhibit significant deficits in imitation skills. Reciprocal Imitation Training (RIT), a naturalistic imitation intervention, was developed to teach young children with autism to imitate during play. This study used a randomized controlled trial to evaluate the efficacy of RIT on elicited and spontaneous imitation skills in 21 young children with autism. Results found that children in the treatment group made significantly more gains in elicited and spontaneous imitation, replicating previous single-subject design studies. Number of spontaneous play acts at pre-treatment was related to improvements in imitation during the intervention, suggesting that children with a greater play repertoire make greater gains during RIT.

Early Intervention for Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder Under 3 Years of Age: Recommendations for Practice and Research

“…Two of these studies evaluated the same sample of children aged 3 or 4 years at the beginning of treatment. 32,33 To briefly summarize these 6 studies [17][18][19][20]32,33,38 33 and small effect sizes after 13 months for parent-child interaction measures. 18 It is notable that targeted interventions generally focused on outcomes related to ASDspecific characteristics, whereas the comprehensive models included teaching to the core deficits but often did not measure changes in these core deficits (or obtained nonsignificant findings); they instead focused on gains in general functioning (eg, cognitive and/or adaptive skills).…”

“…(This lack of change may reflect the utilization of symptom measures such as the Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule, which, as a diagnostic tool, was designed to be relatively stable; measures specifically designed and validated as being sensitive to change are needed.) Specifically, targeted interventions have been associated with gains in imitation, 16,19 joint attention, 16,20,32,34 social engagement, 20,32,33 other social communication measures, 34 and functional and symbolic play. 20,32 Impaired effortful control (ie, a reduced ability to regulate attention, emotions, and behavior to achieve goals) has been reported in children with ASD as early as at 24 months of age.…”

There are Gains, But can we Tell for Whom and Why? Predictors of Treatment Response Following Group Early Start Denver Model Intervention in Preschool - Aged Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

“…Better play skills at entry to intervention also predicted greater improvements in children's overall adaptive behaviour over the course of the intervention in regression analyses, and were associated with improvements in developmental abilities (Visual Reception, Receptive Language, and overall score on the MSEL) in correlational analyses. Previous research has demonstrated that play skills affect response to treatment among children with ASD, and these skills may be particularly important in predicting treatment response to the ESDM, which is a play-based intervention [28][29][30][31]42,65].…”

La detección e intervención tempranas en menores con trastorno del espectro autista

“…Por lo general son programas que tienen una duración corta (de 4 a 6 meses), no son intensivos (como mucho 10-12 sesiones semanales) y tratan de desarrollar habilidades concretas como por ejemplo la atención conjunta y el juego simbólico (Gulsrud, Kasari, Freeman y Paparella, 2007), la sincronía interactiva, la comunicación y habilidades de interacción (Wong y Kwan, 2010), la imitación (Ingersoll, 2010) o la adquisición del sistema PECS (Yoder y Lieberman, 2010).…”

“…Otro estudio muy relevante sobre un programa específico es el realizado por Ingersoll (Ingersoll, 2010), que consistió en un ensayo aleatorio controlado sobre la intervención en un marco naturalista para enseñar imitación recíproca a niños pequeños con TEA. Se trataba de incrementar, mediante la intervención, la motivación de los niños para relacionarse e imitar a otros.…”