title: Relations among joint attention, amount of intervention and language gain in autism.
abstract: The purpose of the present study was to investigate the unconditional and conditional relations between amount of intervention and language development in children with autism. Joint attention skills were proposed as child characteristics that might moderate this relation. The results replicated previous findings that better joint attention skills were associated with greater language development. The results further indicated that the relation between amount of intervention and gain in language age was conditional; it depended upon the child's ability to respond to bids for joint attention from others and initial language skills. The current study demonstrated the utility of employing characteristics of children as moderators of relations between interventions and developmental outcomes.
authors.affiliation: Los Angles County Department of Public Social Services Research, Evaluation and Quality Assurance Division, West Annex City of Industry, CA 91746-3411, USA. mbono@ladpss.org
authors.forename: Michael A
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Bono
authors.forename: L Tamara
authors.initials: LT
authors.lastname: Daley
authors.forename: Marian
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Sigman
mesh_terms: D001288:Attention; D001321:Autistic Disorder / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000523:psychology*; D002652:Child Behavior; D002675:Child, Preschool; D018479:Early Intervention, Educational; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007360:Intelligence; D007804:Language Development; D008297:Male; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires