Using Self-Management and Visual Cues to Improve Responses to Nonverbal Social Cues in Adults With Autism Spectrum Disorder.

Many individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) experience challenges with social communication, including recognizing and responding to non-verbal cues. The purpose of this study was to assess the efficacy of self-management combined with textual cues to teach adults with ASD to recognize and respond to nonverbal expressions of boredom and confusion during social conversation. A multiple baseline across participants design was used to assess the efficacy of this intervention for three participants. Results showed substantial gains across all participants in their recognition and responsiveness to the targeted nonverbal cues. Moreover, this skill maintained after the completion of intervention and generalized to novel conversation partners and settings with large effect sizes. The findings add to the literature base on interventions for adults with ASD, and further support the use of self-management and textual cues as effective intervention strategies for improving nonverbal communication.

Seeing the Whole Elephant: a scoping review of behavioral treatments for pediatric insomnia.

Pediatric insomnia is common, impacting up to a third of typically-developing, healthy children, and over 80% of children with neurodevelopmental disorders or chronic medical conditions. Previous reviews of behavioral interventions for pediatric insomnia have had a limited focus on a single age group, a specific population, and/or only randomized controlled trials. Furthermore, few reviews have considered non-sleep outcomes of both children and their parents. This scoping review provides a broader context, including studies regardless of research design or population, along with sleep and non-sleep study outcomes. Clear gaps in the literature were identified, highlighting the need for additional research in different populations, including school-age children and adolescents, racial/ethnic groups around the world, as well as youth with medical or psychiatric disorders. In addition, more research is needed on different features of treatment, including the delivery mode, involvement of all family members, non-sleep outcomes, and long-term follow-up.