Background: Pivotal response treatment (PRT) is suggested to be an effective treatment for children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Objectives: We aimed to compile evidence examining the effectiveness of PRT on social communication, social interaction, and repetitive behavior for children with ASD. Methods: We performed a systematic and…

Previous research by Williams, Siegel and Mazefsky (2018) investigated the relationship between verbal abilities and problem behaviors using data from the Autism Inpatient Collection (AIC). This research found a weak and inconsistent association between verbal abilities and problem behavior severity; however, adapting/coping scores were…

The purpose of this study is to examine the bidirectional relationship between children's language development and challenging behaviors as well as the moderating roles of gender and race/ethnicity. We conducted a number of structural equation modeling analyses with a national representative sample (N = 2,462) of Head Start children from the 2014…

Purpose: Children with poor language tend to have worse psychosocial outcomes compared to their typically developing peers. The most common explanations for such adversities focus on developmental psychological processes whereby poor language triggers psychosocial difficulties. Here, we investigate the possibility of shared biological effects by…

Research suggests that children with behavioural difficulties exhibit "positive illusory bias" (PIB), in which they overestimate their competencies leading to a perception of self that is more positive than the perceptions held by their peers, parents or teachers. However, research to date has focused on children of elementary school age…

Introduction: Children and young adults with Down syndrome can demonstrate increased behavior problems compared to their typically developing peers through childhood and adolescence. Though current tools measure behavior problems in persons with intellectual disabilities, they do not capture all the behavioral problems that can occur in…

This study examined the relations between problem behaviors and early learning outcomes among 138 children in dual-language pre-K programs who were identified at the beginning of the school year to be at risk for difficulties in early language and literacy development. Children's expressive and receptive vocabulary, listening comprehension, and…

This community effectiveness trial examined the feasibility and efficacy of a comprehensive psychosocial treatment for 28 children, aged 7 to 10 years with high-functioning autism spectrum disorders (HFASDs). Treatment included instruction and therapeutic activities targeting social skills, face-emotion recognition skills, interest expansion, and…

Objective: The first objective of this study was to compare the written expression competence of young adults with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) with that of young adults without ADHD on three types of measures: indicators of the story's microstructure with regard to productivity and morphosyntax; indicators of the macrostructure…

This preliminary study examined the effects of 10 weekly lessons of therapeutic horseback riding (THR) on 42 participants diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder (ages 6-16 years) compared to a subset (n=16) of the total study population who were first evaluated before and after a 10-week waitlist control condition. All participants received…

The goal of this study was to develop an empirically derived classification system for selective mutism (SM) using parent-report measures of social anxiety, behavior problems, and communication delays. The sample consisted of parents of 130 children (ages 5-12) with SM. Results from latent profile analysis supported a 3-class solution made up of…

Cross-cultural differences in emotional expressions following disappointment were examined in 59 Chinese American (CA) and 58 European American (EA) children. Children aged four or seven participated in a disappointing gift situation. Dimensions of expressive behaviors following disappointment were coded and included positive, negative, social…

This study examined early childhood characteristics of 82 11-year- old boys with either reading disabilities (RD) only, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) only, or both conditions. At ages 3 and 5 the RD only boys had performed poorly on measures of receptive and expressive language, whereas the RD/ADHD groups performed poorly on…