Preliminary efficacy of a daily living skills intervention for adolescents with high-functioning autism spectrum disorder

Abstract

Daily living skills deficits are strongly associated with poor adult outcomes for individuals with high-functioning autism spectrum disorder, and yet, there are no group interventions targeting daily living skills. Seven adolescents with autism spectrum disorder and their parents participated in a feasibility pilot of a 12-week manualized group treatment targeting specific daily living skills (i.e. morning routine, cooking, laundry, and money management). Outcomes included the Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scales, Second Edition (Vineland-II) age equivalence scores and four goal attainment scaling scores. Adolescents demonstrated significant improvement on two Vineland-II subdomains and on all goal attainment scaling scores at post-treatment and 6-month follow-up. The intervention has promise for improving critical daily living skills' deficits that affect independent living and employment. Limitations and implications for future studies are discussed.

Adaptive Behavior as an Alternative Outcome to Intelligence Quotient in Studies of Children at Risk: A Study of Preschool-Aged Children in Flint, MI, USA

“…Thus, adaptive behavior may serve as a proximal indication of how an individual functions within developmentally relevant contexts and provide additional information important for conceptualizing the profile of risk of an individual child and resilience in their specific environment (Test et al, 2009 ; Bal et al, 2015 ; Dell'Armo and Tassé, 2019 ). In addition, adaptive behavior has been shown to be amenable to treatment in children with developmental disabilities (Matson et al, 2012 ; Bal et al, 2015 ; Duncan et al, 2018 ), making it a particularly appealing endpoint for targeted interventions.…”

Iterative Development of a Daily Living Skills Intervention for Adolescents with Autism Without an Intellectual Disability

“…Our team then conducted an initial feasibility study of the STRW group intervention in the outpatient setting with seven adolescents with ASD without an ID and their parents (Duncan et al, 2017) using a pre-post design. Adolescents were eligible to participate if they met the following criteria:…”

“…STRW consisted of 12 weekly, 90-min, concurrent parent and adolescent sessions that targeted personal hygiene and self-care, laundry, kitchen safety and cooking in the microwave, stove, and oven, and basic money management skills. Adolescent sessions focused on direct instruction and practice of specific DLS and parent sessions targeted how to successfully implement a behavior contract to teach, practice, and master DLS at home (Duncan et al, 2017). One therapist facilitated the parent sessions, and two therapists facilitated the adolescent sessions.…”

“…We anticipate enrolling over 100 adolescents with ASD without an ID between the ages of 14 and 18. Inclusion criteria for the current study is identical to our previous efficacy studies (Duncan et al, 2017;. Our primary aim is to determine if adolescents with ASD make significant DLS gains as assessed by both the Vineland-3 and GAS when compared to an intervention targeting social skills.…”

Measuring the Impact of Bilingualism on Executive Functioning Via Inhibitory Control Abilities in Autistic Children.

“…Autistic people are known to have highly heterogeneous individual profiles, which can include delays in language onset and use, concurrent intellectual disability and sensory atypicalities (Lord et al, 2020). These can have a broad range of consequences for daily functioning (Duncan et al, 2018), social relationships (Elmose, 2020), sensory experience and learning (Jones et al, 2020), and mental health alongside overall quality of life (Dijkhuis, 2017).…”