John J. Wheeler

Treatment Integrity A Review of Intervention Studies Conducted With Children With Autism

The purpose of this study Was to assess the degree to Which behavioral intervention studies conducted With children diagnosed With autism operationally defined the independent variables (IVs) and evaluated treatment integrity (TI). The study replicated the criteria from Gresham, Gansle, and Noell (1993) and focused exclusively on research studies conducted With children diagnosed With autism Who Were age 18 years or younger. Results indicated that of the 60 studies that Were critically revieWed, 11 operationally defined the IVs and assessed TI. Conversely, the majority of the studies (n = 41) operationally defined the IVs yet did not assess TI. Last, 3 studies operationally defined the IVs and referred to TI Within the paper but provided no data, and 5 studies did not define IVs or assess TI.

Including Children with Autism in General Education in China.

I n the People’s Republic of China, a greater social attention to the education of children with special needs began to occur in the late 1970s, when President Deng Xiaoping introduced the Reform and Open Door policy. Since then, special education in China has experienced significant reform and fast development, as well as profound political, economic, and social changes. However, education for children with severe developmental disabilities, especially autism, has long been the greatest challenge in special education. Since the occurrence of autism is not subject to such factors as race, ethnicity, or social backgrounds, the prevalence of autism used by Western countries is also applicable in China. If we use the current conservative prevalence of autism (i.e., 15 per 10,000 births) to calculate, it can be estimated that China, with a population of 1.3 billion, has approximately 1.95 million individuals with autism at various levels of functioning. Considering that 75 to 80 percent of the Chinese population resides in remote, rural areas and might experience financial and technical constraints related to identification of autism (e.g., lack of expertise and unavailability of systematic framework for identification and diagnosis), it is reasonable to estimate that approximately 75 to 80 percent of the 1.95 million individuals with autism have not yet been identified or diagnosed properly. In reality, many individuals with both autism and cognitive impairments have been simply diagnosed with cognitive disabilities (e.g., mental retardation), due to psychiatrists’ lack of knowledge about autism (Tao, 1987). In China, so far, no official data have been released regarding the number of individuals with a diagnosis of autism. According to experts from the Institute of Mental Health, Beijing University, it is estimated that China has approximately 400,000 to 500,000 children (between ages 3 to 18) with autism at various levels of functioning (M.X. Jia, personal communication, November 26, 2005). However, due to the lack of knowledge and awareness, autism has been misunderstood in Mainland China for years and often has been thought of as a rare illness that is contracted by relatively few individuals. Therefore, it has not been officially specified under the category of mental disorders until recently. Currently, the official diagnostic criteria for autism in China are listed in the Chinese Classification and Diagnostic Criteria of Mental Disorders, Version 3 (CCMD-3rd, Chinese Psychiatry Association, 2001). Due t o the lack o f

Analyzing the Treatment Efficacy of a Technical Assistance Model for Providing Behavioral Consultation to Schools

The reauthorization of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act of 1997 emphasized the use of positive behavioral interventions, supports, and services for students with disabilities who display challenging behaviors. Unfortunately, most teachers and schools still lack systems for identification, adoption, and sustained use of these research-validated practices almost a decade after the passage of this legislation. Schools therefore rely on behavioral consultation for technical assistance in designing appropriate interventions for children who exhibit challenging behavior. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the treatment efficacy of a university-based behavioral consultation model, as perceived by teachers. Results demonstrated that teachers accepted the behavioral consultation model as an effective method of reducing incidences and severity of challenging behaviors.

The development of an instrument to evaluate treatment intrusiveness for individuals with severe and challenging behavior

The current study examined the use of an instrument designed to evaluate the intrusiveness of treatments for addressing problem behaviors. Participants read case vignettes with proposed treatments and then completed a checklist of factors that could influence the degree of treatment intrusiveness. Results indicated that the participants were capable of using the instrument to differentiate among treatments that were considered to have varying levels of treatment intrusiveness. Implications of using a systematic method for evaluating the intrusiveness of treatments are discussed.

Chapter 12 Other innovative techniques: Positive behavior supports and response to intervention

The 1997 Reauthorization of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) ushered in a new paradigm for addressing challenging behavior in students with disabilities with the advent of PBS. However, the groundwork for the PBS movement initiated with a paper published by Horner and colleagues (1990) that described the need for nonaversive behavioral interventions in working with persons with severe disabilities. Although some have seen PBS as an outgrowth of applied behavior analysis (ABA) (Anderson & Freeman, 2000), others within the field of behavior analysis have been critical of PBS as being spawned more out of an ideological bent rather than as a research-based model (Johnston, Foxx, Jacobson, Green, & Mulick, 2006).