Training mildly handicapped peers to facilitate changes in the social interaction skills of autistic children.
We evaluated the effects of a peer-training strategy, consisting of direct prompting and modeling, on the occurrence and duration of interactions between autistic students and nonautistic peer-trainers. Data were obtained in both training and generalization settings. The results of a multiple-baseline design across students demonstrated that:the direct prompting procedure produced immediate and substantial increases in the occurrences and durations of positive social interactions between the peer-trainers and autistic students; these increases were maintained across time at levels above baseline during subsequent free-play probes; these findings were judged by teachers to be socially valid; untrained peers increased their interactions with the autistic students in three of the four groups; generalization of behavior change across settings occurred only after specific programming; and interactions between untrained peers and peer-trainers decreased following training. Variables that may account for the results and the implications of these findings for peer-mediated interventions are discussed.
D001321:Autistic Disorder / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005246:Feedback; D005260:Female; D005793:Generalization, Psychological; D006801:Humans; D007100:Imitative Behavior; D007398:Interpersonal Relations; D007805:Language Development Disorders / Q000523:psychology; D008297:Male; D010379:Peer Group; D010988:Play and Playthings; D011214:Practice, Psychological