Measuring Changes in Social Communication Behaviors: Preliminary Development of the Brief Observation of Social Communication Change (BOSCC)

Grzadzinski, Rebecca; Carr, Themba; Colombi, Costanza; McGuire, Kelly A.; Dufek, Sarah; Pickles, Andrew; Lord, Catherine

doi:10.1007/s10803-016-2782-9

Cited by 169 publications

(211 citation statements)

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“…35 Following this, the Brief Observation of Social Communication Change was developed specifically to assess changes in social communication skills of children with ASD. 40 Longitudinal data from children with ASD suggest that the Brief Observation of Social Communication Change may be more sensitive to change than the ADOS, 40 and we cannot rule out the possibility that music therapy brought about changes in social affect that were not detected using the ADOS.…”

Section: Strengths and Weaknesses Of The Study Designmentioning

confidence: 94%

“…Such research should include validated measures of social communication that are more sensitive to change, such as the Brief Observation of Social Communication Change. 40 Following feedback from parents about their experience of seeing changes in broader aspects of child mental health, such as anxiety, we believe that such studies should also include these important aspects of mental health. Assessing the impact of interventions for children with autism on anxiety is particularly important given the associations between anxiety and social functioning.…”

Section: Implications For Services and Future Researchmentioning

confidence: 99%

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International multicentre randomised controlled trial of improvisational music therapy for children with autism spectrum disorder: TIME-A study

Crawford

Gold

Odell‐Miller

et al. 2017

Health Technol Assess

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Background Preliminary studies have indicated that music therapy may benefit children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD). Objectives To examine the effects of improvisational music therapy (IMT) on social affect and responsiveness of children with ASD. Design International, multicentre, three-arm, single-masked randomised controlled trial, including a National Institute for Health Research (NIHR)-funded centre that recruited in London and the east of England. Randomisation was via a remote service using permuted blocks, stratified by study site. Setting Schools and private, voluntary and state-funded health-care services. Participants Children aged between 4 and 7 years with a confirmed diagnosis of ASD and a parent or guardian who provided written informed consent. We excluded children with serious sensory disorder and those who had received music therapy within the past 12 months. Interventions All parents and children received enhanced standard care (ESC), which involved three 60-minute sessions of advice and support in addition to treatment as usual. In addition, they were randomised to either one (low-frequency) or three (high-frequency) sessions of IMT per week, or to ESC alone, over 5 months in a ratio of 1 : 1 : 2. Main outcome measures The primary outcome was measured using the social affect score derived from the Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule (ADOS) at 5 months: higher scores indicated greater impairment. Secondary outcomes included social affect at 12 months and parent-rated social responsiveness at 5 and 12 months (higher scores indicated greater impairment). Results A total of 364 participants were randomised between 2011 and 2015. A total of 182 children were allocated to IMT (90 to high-frequency sessions and 92 to low-frequency sessions), and 182 were allocated to ESC alone. A total of 314 (86.3%) of the total sample were followed up at 5 months [165 (90.7%) in the intervention group and 149 (81.9%) in the control group]. Among those randomised to IMT, 171 (94.0%) received it. From baseline to 5 months, mean scores of ADOS social affect decreased from 14.1 to 13.3 in music therapy and from 13.5 to 12.4 in standard care [mean difference: music therapy vs. standard care = 0.06, 95% confidence interval (CI) –0.70 to 0.81], with no significant difference in improvement. There were also no differences in the parent-rated social responsiveness score, which decreased from 96.0 to 89.2 in the music therapy group and from 96.1 to 93.3 in the standard care group over this period (mean difference: music therapy vs. standard care = –3.32, 95% CI –7.56 to 0.91). There were seven admissions to hospital that were unrelated to the study interventions in the two IMT arms compared with 10 unrelated admissions in the ESC group. Conclusions Adding IMT to the treatment received by children with ASD did not improve social affect or parent-assessed social responsiveness. Future work Other methods for delivering music-focused interventions for children with ASD should be explored. Trial registration Current Controlled Trials ISRCTN78923965. Funding This project was funded by the NIHR Health Technology Assessment programme and will be published in full in Health Technology Assessment; Vol. 21, No. 59. See the NIHR Journals Library website for further project information.

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Section: Strengths and Weaknesses Of The Study Designmentioning

confidence: 94%

Section: Implications For Services and Future Researchmentioning

confidence: 99%

International multicentre randomised controlled trial of improvisational music therapy for children with autism spectrum disorder: TIME-A study

Crawford

Gold

Odell‐Miller

et al. 2017

Health Technol Assess

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…This makes it highly suitable for LMIC implementation, and this trial was its first usage in this setting. The BOSCC shows excellent inter‐rater reliability, satisfactory‐excellent internal consistency and good test‐retest reliability [Grzadzinski et al, ; Kitzerow, Teufel, Wilker, & Freitag, ]. There is less data to date on concurrent or criterion validity, although overall correlation with ADOS is generally reported.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Feasibility and Effectiveness of PASS Plus, A Lay Health Worker Delivered Comprehensive Intervention for Autism Spectrum Disorders: Pilot RCT in a Rural Low and Middle Income Country Setting

et al. 2018

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This article describes the development of a comprehensive, community-delivered, intervention for young children with autism, which combines a previously developed parent-mediated communication intervention with support for co-morbid problems like challenging behaviors and sensory sensitivities. The unique aspect of this intervention is that it can be delivered by community health workers, addressing the lack of specialists in low resource settings. Our study reports the encouraging findings of a pilot trial evaluating its feasibility and effectiveness.

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“…Items in the BOSCC were adapted from the second edition of the Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule (ADOS‐2; Lord et al, ), with an expanded coding range to increase sensitivity to change. Based on a validation by the measure authors, the BOSCC appears to be reliable across raters and brief time intervals and shows convergent validity with other measures of social communication [Grzadzinski et al, ]. Results in terms of sensitivity to change have been mixed, with some studies finding that the BOSCC captures change [Grzadzinski et al, ; Kitzerow, Teufel, Wilker, & Freitag, ; Pijl et al, ], and others finding no significant change over time [Fletcher‐Watson et al, ; Nordahl‐Hansen, Fletcher‐Watson, McConachie, & Kaale, ].…”

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confidence: 99%

Measuring child social communication across contexts: Similarities and differences across play and snack routines

et al. 2019

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Improving measurement of outcomes in randomized controlled trials of early interventions for autism spectrum disorder (ASD) has been identified as a priority in the field. In addition, the importance of measurement across contexts has been indicated by researchers and community stakeholders alike [Lord et al., ; McConachie et al., ; Schreibman et al., ]. The Brief Observation of Social Communication Change (BOSCC; Grzadzinski et al., ), an observational rating scheme of brief play interactions, was developed to address a need for measures that are reliable, sensitive to change, and valid for use in research settings. The goal of this study was to examine the feasibility and utility of applying the BOSCC to a new context: a home snack routine. Results suggest that rating the BOSCC on home snack routines is feasible and psychometrically sound, and captures change in child social communication behaviors. However, the utility of the BOSCC for measuring restricted and repetitive behaviors (RRBs) is less clear. Nonetheless, differences in RRBs across play and snack lend support for the claim that measurement across contexts is essential. Application of the BOSCC across contexts may allow researchers to obtain a more accurate estimate of intervention response and help capture context‐specific changes in social communication. It may also provide a method for researchers to evaluate the effect of context on child social communication more broadly. Autism Res 2019, 12: 636–644. © 2019 International Society for Autism Research, Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Lay Summary Improving measurement of outcomes in studies of early interventions for autism spectrum disorder (ASD) has been identified as a priority in the field. The importance of measurement across contexts has also been indicated by researchers and community stakeholders. The goal of this study was to determine whether an existing observational rating scheme, the Brief Observation of Social Communication Change (BOSCC), could be applied to a new activity: a home snack routine. Results suggest that rating the BOSCC on home snack routines is feasible and promising for capturing change over time. In addition, some child behaviors differed across play and snack, lending further support for the claim that measurement across activities is essential.

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Measuring Changes in Social Communication Behaviors: Preliminary Development of the Brief Observation of Social Communication Change (BOSCC)

Cited by 169 publications

References 60 publications

International multicentre randomised controlled trial of improvisational music therapy for children with autism spectrum disorder: TIME-A study

International multicentre randomised controlled trial of improvisational music therapy for children with autism spectrum disorder: TIME-A study

The Feasibility and Effectiveness of PASS Plus, A Lay Health Worker Delivered Comprehensive Intervention for Autism Spectrum Disorders: Pilot RCT in a Rural Low and Middle Income Country Setting

Measuring child social communication across contexts: Similarities and differences across play and snack routines

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