Evaluation of a Self-Instructional Package for Teaching Parents to Conduct Discrete-Trials Teaching with Children with Autism

Abstract

Early Intensive Behavioral Intervention (EIBI) is a treatment for children with Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) that uses the principles of applied behavior analysis. Discrete- trials teaching (DTT) is commonly used in EIBI as a method for teaching children with ASD. DTT involves a teacher presenting an antecedent to the child, waiting for the child’s response, and then providing a consequence for that response (either a reinforcer for a correct response or non-interaction for an incorrect response). In this study I assessed the effectiveness of the Fazzio and Martin DTT self-instructional manual plus video (2011) with mothers of children with ASD as the participants. I used a multiple- baseline design across a pair of participants, and replicated across a second pair. During the baseline assessment, a participant was asked to teach three tasks (pointing-to-named pictures, identity matching and imitation) to a confederate role-playing a child with ASD. The participant was given one-page summaries for each teaching task and no additional information. Once baseline data was collected, the participant had the opportunity to study the self-instructional package, after which she conducted a post-treatment DTT session with the confederate. If she did not achieve mastery (set at 80%) in post-treatment assessment she was provided with a feedback session on her DTT performance, and then conducted an additional DTT session with the confederate. Three of the participants were available to conduct a generalization session with her child. The treatment package was very effective for training two of the mothers with children with ASD to implement DTT, and somewhat effective for the other two mothers who required a feedback session.