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，以继续一个长期研究项目，旨在有效管理行为变异性，以响应旨在为神经发育障碍儿童的符号沟通建立行为先决条件的程序。我们的主要研究对象是患有自闭症谱系障碍（ASDs）的儿童，他们表现出很少或没有明显的口语理解能力，他们的主要交流方式是非语言的。我们项目的一个主要目标是，并将继续评估这些儿童表现出真正的符号关系的潜力，这种关系是根据物理上不同的刺激之间的等效性来定义的（例如，符号和所指之间）。本项目强调的第二个目标是揭示和管理符号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，该方法已经实现了由共享物理特征（即基于物理身份/相似性的刺激关系）定义的刺激等效的直接相关目标。我们的目标将包括：(a)听觉感知、辨别和关系学习，(b)基本的和紧急的符号-参照映射，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伙伴关系。通过这种伙伴关系，我们将能够以很少的额外费用纳入最近接受了建立听力能力的设备（例如人工耳蜗）的语前耳聋儿童群体。这些儿童在符号关系的习得上也表现出差异，因此，他们的符号关系缺陷是由于感觉剥夺而不是asd造成的。我们的研究结果可能不仅对理论而且对临床干预具有重要意义，这些儿童在获得符号关系方面表现出缺陷，特别是那些正在或可能成为增强/替代沟通训练候选人的儿童。

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.