The Autism Society Event and Education Recordings Archive

Most children with ASD have stereotypic behavior that can be stigmatizing and interfere with learning. Assessments geared towards identifying the sensory consequences maintaining stereotypic responding and intervention strategies will be presented. The focus of the session will be to review treatment techniques with case studies and related research results. This session will briefly review research on the prevalence, causes, assessment, and treatment of stereotypy in children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) and other developmental disorders. Stereotypic behavior has been found to occur in both typically developing persons and individuals with disabilities. Its occurrence in persons with autism is among the diagnostic markers for the disorder. Numerous studies have shown that stereotypic behavior typically occurs because of the sensory consequences produced by engaging in it. However, a few studies have shown that stereotypy can also be maintained by escape from demands and access to attention. Cases will be reviewed in which each of these three causes have been identified. Besides being encountered in many different situations, stereotypy occurs in many different forms. Various forms of stereotypy, such as gross motor, fine motor and vocal stereotypy and the challenges to defining and assessing them will be discussed. Assessment procedures and data compiled using these techniques will be briefly presented for children that engage in various forms of stereotypy. Discussion of each of the environmental situations in which stereotypic behavior is commonly encountered will also be provided as well as instruction on how to obtain useful assessment results quickly. One focus of the assessment of stereotypy will be on how to identify the environment in which one should first treat it. Intervention strategies will then be presented, through case examples, to demonstrate how successful interventions have been developed in each environment in which stereotypy is problematic. A discussion of how to identify activities that will successfully compete with stereotypic behavior will be presented. Several cases will be shown in which both activities that match the sensory consequences that are thought to reinforce a child's stereotypy and activities that produce different consequences can be used to make stereotypy less likely to occur during structured and unstructured leisure time. Next attendees will receive instruction on how to interrupt and redirect gross motor, fine motor, and vocal stereotypy. Interruption and redirection can lead to more appropriate alternative behavior occurring without the need to provide extrinsic reinforcement for it. However, some children require additional prompting or environmental supports to engage in higher levels of appropriate behavior. Such prompting techniques and environmental supports will be briefly discussed. Learning Objectives:

1) Attendees will be able to describe the physiological and environmental determinants of stereotypy. 2) Attendees will be able to describe the most effective assessment strategies for stereotypy. 3) Attendees will be able to describe ways to identify the most problematic environment in which stereotypy occurs for a child. 4) Attendees will be able to identify effective treatments for each of the environmental situations in which stereotypy occurs. 5) Attendees will be able to identify the essential components of competing with stereotypic behavior. 6) Attendees will be able to identify the essential components of response interruption/redirection procedures for stereotypic behavior.

Content Area: Behavior Issues and Supports