Abstract
This study examined the effects of adult imitation on three joint attention behaviors of nonverbal preschoolers with autism including referential looking, gaze following and gesturing to the adult. Videotapes taken from a previous study were recoded for the adult’s imitation behavior and the children’s joint attention behaviors (Field, Field, Sanders, & Nadel, 2001). In the original study, twenty nonverbal, 4 - 6-year- old children with autism were randomly assigned to one of two groups, an imitation or a contingent responsivity group. Both groups of children engaged in an intervention play phase during which the adult imitated the children or contingently responded to them and a subsequent spontaneous play phase. ANOVAs revealed that the imitation group children versus the contingent responsivity group children spent a greater percent time looking at the adult during the intervention phase and looking at the adult and following the adult’s gaze during the spontaneous play phase. A correlation analysis on the data collapsed across the 2 groups yielded significant correlations between adult imitation during the intervention phase and referential looking and gaze following during the spontaneous play phase. Overall, these results revealed that adults imitating preschoolers with autism elicited joint attention behaviors, highlighting the value of imitation as an intervention.
Highlights
Children with autism show limited joint attention behavior such as referential looking, gaze following and gesturing (Charman et al, 1997)
A Pearson correlation analysis was conducted on data collapsed across the 2 groups to determine the relations between adult imitation and the child joint attention behaviors
ANOVAs conducted on the three joint attention behaviors revealed that the children in the imitation group spent a greater percent time engaged in referential looking during the intervention phase (F[1, 18] = 12.37, p = .003, partial η2 = .41) as compared to the children in the contingently responsive group
Summary
Children with autism show limited joint attention behavior such as referential looking, gaze following and gesturing (Charman et al, 1997). Some research has noted moderate relationships between imitation and language development (Carpenter, Nagell, Tomasello, Butterworth, & Moore, 1998), while at least one other study reported strong relations between joint-attention and language development (Boucher, 2008). A growing body of research has demonstrated that training children with autism can enhance their social interaction skills (Hwang & Hughes, 2000). Our studies showed that very young children with autism respond to being imitated by increasing both their distal (attention) and proximal (touching) social behaviors during and after imitative interactions (Escalona, Field, Nadel, & Lundy, 2002; Field, Field, Sanders, & Nadel, 2001; Heimann, Laberg, & Nordoen, 2006). The imitation group showed more social behavior than the contingent responsivity group
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