How Children With Asd Communicate With Adults Or People

When reflecting, it is important to consider how children with ASD communicate with adults or people in authority, as well as their peers. It is known there is a power relationship between teachers and students, which has a direct effect on the children’s development (Hayes Matusov, 2005). In fact, the way in which teachers communicate with children has been found to have direct consequences on children’s language development (Dangel Durden, 2010) and social interactions (Stanton-Chapman, 2015; Irvin, Boyd Odom, 2014) both of which are important for those with ASD due to their specific deficits in these areas. It is possible that due to deficits in ToM and executive functioning, which are commonly recorded in ASD (Llaneza, et al.,†¦show more content†¦I did also consider if this was a form of non-verbal communication, particular as these are expressed differently from females with ASD (Kirkovski, Enticott Fitzgerald, 2013). To observe this, I began keeping a diary which documented what factors were frequently present during this behaviour. However, I originally noticed very few situational triggers. Most research into RRBs and ASD focuses on the individual child’s differences which are associated with the behaviour, such as cognitive processing (Chen, Rodger McConaline, 2008) and language skills (Ray-Subramaria Weismer, 2012), offering few explanations. As ABA has a focus on reinforcement, which has been found effective for RRBs (Napolitano, Smith, Zarcone, Goodwin McAdam, 2010) this the first technique I tried. Whilst this had temporary success, it did not prevent Child C from returning to the behaviour once the reinforcement stopped. Furthermore, from my reflective diary entries it became clear that this method was not reducing RRBs during the sessions. This suggests reinforcement did not have longitudinal maintenance. Consequently, I decided to approach the RRB’s as another method of communication. As RRB’s give a functional and therapeutic effect (Grandin, 2011), it is possible that the behaviour was a method of communicating anxiety. In order to better