جستجوی مقالات مرتبط با کلیدواژه « High-Functioning Autism Disorder » در نشریات گروه « روانشناسی »

Children suffering from ASD, despite having verbal and linguistic abilities, often find it challenging to grasp synonyms and metaphorical language, which can lead to confusion and misunderstanding. They cannot successfully understand and use metaphorical expressions like normal children. The speech of these children shows that they understand and use grammar and language rules. However, they are unsuccessful in understanding metaphorical expressions and their use. For this purpose, the most basic metaphorical concepts were taught to these children with the help of collaborative story reading, and the efficiency of this knowledge was investigated in order to achieve better results. The present study is an attempt to answer the question of whether three- to five-year-old Persian-speaking children with the autistic disorder can understand and use embodied metaphors with the intervention of shared story-reading.

The present research method was interventional-analytical. This field research investigated Persian-speaking children from districts 1, 5, and 17 of Tehran, Iran. In this research, 20 Persian-speaking girls and boys aged three to five years, half of whom are ten girls and ten boys with an equal number of self-esteem disorders (with high functioning), were the statistical population of the research. Children were divided into two groups, control, and intervention, for better investigation. In shared story reading, 20 original stories were designed with metaphorical expressions taken from Shoja Razavi ey al’s research (2015) and ten disturbing agent stories (without metaphorical expressions). During ten face-to-face sessions, these stories were presented to healthy and independent children employing a talking doll. Children in the control group were only given disturbing stories, but children in the intervention group received 30 stories (20 main and ten disturbing stories) during ten story reading sessions. Before story reading, after story reading, and 40 days after the intervention, the children of the control and intervention groups asked for metaphorical expressions with double cards taken from Shoja Razavi’s research (2015). The physical fitness test was scored based on the answers to the double cards according to Shoja Razavi et al.’s scoring method (2015). Finally, children’s learning and acceptance level after the shared story-reading course is investigated. In the last stage, the statistical data were analyzed through non-parametric analysis, and the effect of repeated measurements was tested using the Chi2 test in SPSS-24 software.

Three to 5-year-old healthy and independent children performed better in understanding the abstract concepts of embodied metaphors through the shared story-reading program. Furthermore, after the program’s implementation, the scores of high-performing self-retained children in the post-test were significantly better than in the pre-test. These findings show that shared story reading can increase thses children’s understanding of bodily metaphors.

The results of the tests show that the shared story-reading intervention positively affects the understanding of the metaphors of taste, smell, color, touch, shape, sound, movement, and speed in independent children. In general, the shared intervention can significantly improve the understanding of bodily metaphors in children aged 3-5 years. The results of three- to four-year-old children left alone in the group receiving the intervention of taste (72.5%), color (72.5%), smell (40%), shape (55%), size (45%), movement (70%), speed (55%) %), object (62.5%), sound (30%), and touch (55%) were reported. Results of four- to five-year-old children left alone in the group receiving the intervention, taste (80%), color (80%), smell (62.5%), shape (75%), size (70%), movement (75%), speed (65%), object (70%), sound (45%), and touch (65%) were reported. As it was observed, in addition to shared story reading, age is also seen as an effective factor in understanding embodied metaphorical expressions; in other words, a better understanding of metaphors requires more cognitive development at older ages.

The aim of this study was to develop and determine the effectiveness of a virtual support program on challenging behaviors and social skills of children with high-functioning autism. The research method was combined. In the qualitative section, 14 experts were selected as participants by purposive sampling. Using the theoretical coding method, a virtual support program was developed for 11 purposes. In the quantitative part, the research method was quasi-experimental with a pre-test-post-test design and control group. The statistical population included all boys aged 7 to 11 years with autism referred to Padideh and Rahyab medical and rehabilitation centers in Tehran in 2020. Among them, 20 people were selected by purposive sampling method and randomly assigned to 2 experimental groups (10 people) and a control group (10 people). The experimental group received a virtual support program for 13 sessions (2 sessions per week); the control group was placed on a waiting list for 2 months. In order to collect information, the Challenging Behaviors Questionnaire of Budfish et al. (2000) and Gersham & Elliott's (1990) Social Skills Questionnaire, were used. Data were analyzed using univariate and multivariate analyses of covariance. Findings showed that the virtual support program had a significant effect on reducing challenging behaviors and improving the social skills of the experimental group (P <0.001). Therefore, it is suggested that psychologists and educators in the field of children with autism use the virtual support program to manage and reduce the psychological problems of these children and help their parents due to the prevailing conditions caused by the coronavirus.

The aim of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of psychosocial intervention on attention shifting, working memory and planning in children with high functioning autism disorder. Design of the study was Semi- experimental with pre-test, posttest with control group. The subjects of this study were 24 children that were diagnosed with high functioning autism disorder that was selected with convenience sampling method and assigned in two groups (12 students in experimental group, 12 students in control group). Data were collected through; The Behavior rating Inventory of Executive Function (BRIEF) and the Autism Spectrum Quotient (ASQ) were used. Then therapeutic program based on psycho-social training was performed for the experimental group in 20 sessions and at the end post-test was taken of all subjects of experimental and control group. Data were analyzed by MACNOVA. The results showed that therapy based on psychosocial training has significant and positive impact on working memory (f ₌ 107/362, p0/001) and planning (f₌60/928, p0/001) of children with high functioning autism disorder, but has not significant impact on shifting attention. Training can improve working memory and planning in children with high functioning autism disorder.