While no exact information on the prevalence exists, it is assumed that the overall incidence of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) has risen every year in Japan. However, given the lack of resources and services for families of children with ASD in Japan, there is a dearth of practical guidance for the support for those families. This…

Adults with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), who were interested in working as behavior technicians for young children with autism, participated in 2 experiments. Participants included 5 adults with Asperger syndrome or pervasive developmental disorder not otherwise specified, 19 to 23 years old, and 11 children with autism, 3 to 7 years old. In…

This study evaluated the acquisition of incidental and observational information presented to 6 children with autism in a small group instructional arrangement using a constant time delay (CTD) procedure. A multiple probe design across behaviors, replicated across 6 participants, was used to evaluate the effectiveness of the CTD procedure and to…

Children with autism often have difficulty successfully applying newly acquired skills to novel situations. Naturalistic teaching procedures have been developed to help address this problem with generalization. These naturalistic procedures promote generalization through the use of natural consequences, diverse training, and the incorporation of…

Successful inclusion is facilitated when children with autism fit in and interact in meaningful ways with their typical peers. However, deficits in conversational language likely limit the social attractiveness of children with autism to their classmates. This study evaluated an incidental teaching approach to promoting use of age-appropriate…

Incidental teaching and traditional discrete-trial procedures were used to teach two children (ages 10 and 12) with autism the expressive use of two color adjectives. Results demonstrated that traditional discrete-trial teaching was more efficient and produced faster acquisition but incidental teaching resulted in greater generalization and equal…

This study assessed effects of a procedure to train two therapists and a college intern in the techniques of incidental teaching. Training took place in a community-based group home serving five autistic children. The training procedure promoted generalization of skills across materials, settings, children, and group size. (Author/PB)

Begins with a review of research on learning style differences associated with autism, then examines instructional strategies of both behavioral and incidental teaching methods. Using an illustrative case study, it describes how visually cued instruction can be applied with autistic children who are visual learners. (DB)

This commentary addresses the effectiveness of different intervention approaches for young children with autism. It lists reasons why one approach is not better than another, discusses the tenets of practices that must be addressed in intervention approaches for young children with autism, and describes contributions and limitations of different…

A program was implemented to increase the manual signing of five profoundly retarded (mean age, 19 years) and four autistic (mean age, 9 years) youth within their daily environment. (Author)

Three typical preschoolers were trained as peer tutors for three young children with autism. Tutors used incidental teaching to obtain verbal labels of preferred toys by children with autism. Adult supervision and assistance were faded systematically with resulting maintenance of increased reciprocal interactions. (Author/JDD)

The effects of analog language teaching and natural language teaching on language generalization and long-term retention in 23 adults with autism and severe/profound mental retardation were examined. Natural language teaching was found to have many strengths and few drawbacks and to produce equal generalization and retention under conditions…