Optimizing Initial Communication for Children with Autism

描述（由申请人提供）：初级沟通者的行为变异性管理本申请寻求支持，以继续开展一项长期研究计划，旨在有效管理行为变异性，以响应旨在为患有神经发育障碍的儿童建立符号沟通的行为先决条件的程序。我们的主要研究人群是患有自闭症谱系障碍 (ASD) 的儿童，他们对口语的理解很少或根本没有，并且主要的交流方式是非语言。我们计划的一个主要目标一直是并将继续是评估这些儿童表现出真正的象征关系的潜力，这些象征关系在操作上是根据物理上不同的刺激之间的等效性（例如，象征和所指对象之间）来定义的。本项目强调的第二个目标是发现和管理象征关系习得过程中行为变异的来源。为了构建我们的程序，我们将扩展一种方法，该方法已实现与由共享物理特征定义的刺激等效性直接相关的目标（即基于物理身份/相似性的刺激关系）。我们的目标将包括：（a）听觉感知、辨别和关系学习，（b）基本和紧急的符号指涉映射，以及（c）模态内和跨模态等价类形成。为了补充和补充我们对自闭症谱系障碍儿童的研究，我们将扩大与巴西从事直接相关研究的研究人员的国际合作伙伴关系。通过这种伙伴关系，我们将能够以很少的额外成本纳入最近接受了建立听力能力的设备（例如人工耳蜗）的语前性耳聋儿童群体。这些儿童在获得象征关系方面也表现出变异性，因此形成了一个对比群体，其象征关系缺陷可归因于感觉剥夺而不是自闭症谱系障碍。我们的研究结果可能不仅对理论具有重要意义，而且对那些在获得象征关系方面表现出缺陷的儿​​童的临床干预也具有重要意义，特别是那些正在或可能成为增强/替代性沟通训练候选者的儿童。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Behavioral Variability Management in Beginning Communicators This application seeks support to continue a long-term program of study aimed at effective management of behavioral variability in response to procedures designed to establish behavioral prerequisites for symbolic communication in children with neurodevelopmental disabilities. Our primary study population will be children with autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) who exhibit little or no apparent comprehension of spoken language and whose primary mode of communication is nonverbal. A major goal of our program has been and will continue to be to assess the potential of such children to exhibit true symbolic relations, defined operationally in terms of equivalence between physically dissimilar stimuli (e.g., between symbol and referent). A second goal, emphasized in the present project, will be to uncover and manage sources of behavioral variability in acquisition of symbolic relations. To structure our program, we will extend an approach that has achieved a directly related goal with stimulus equivalence defined by shared physical features (i.e., stimulus relations based on physical identity/similarity). Our targets will include: (a) auditory perception, discrimination, and relational learning, (b) basic and emergent symbol-referent mapping, and (c) intra- and cross-modal equivalence class formation. To supplement and complement our studies of children with ASDs, we will expand an international partnership with researchers in Brasil who are pursuing directly related research. Via this partnership, we will be able to include at little added cost a population of children with pre-lingual deafness who are recent recipients of devices that establish hearing capabilities (e.g., cochlear implants). These children also exhibit variability in acquisition of symbolic relations, thus presenting a contrast population whose symbolic relational deficits are attributable to sensory deprivation rather than ASDs. Results of our studies are likely to have significance not only for theory but also for clinical intervention with children who show deficits in acquiring symbolic relations, particularly those children who are or who may become candidates for augmentative/alternative communication training.