Parent-Implemented Telepractice Autism Intervention: A Case Study of Maintenance and Generalization

Abstract

The extent to which people maintain new skills and generalize those skills to new contexts without support are two aspects of intervention research that can be difficult to examine, especially over a sustained period of time and across a variety of contexts. In past research, we have explored teaching parents and caregivers to implement evidence-based communication strategies with their young children with autism who are minimally verbal. When a former research participant contacted us with a request to participate in our project again, four years later and with a different son, we used this as an opportunity to ask questions about her maintenance of the skills in using the targeted strategies, and her generalization of those skills to a different child. Using the data collected with her older son, Ali, and new data collected four years later with her younger son, Rami, we present a case study of this mother. We discuss the implications of the findings on interpreting the efficacy of the telepractice intervention’s programming for generalization, identifying opportunities for refining the intervention, and insights useful for other intervention research.