lecture 5- play and autism Flashcards
(17 cards)
autism spectrum condition
Lifelong, neurodevelopmental condition that affects
how a person communicates with and relates to other
people, and how they experience the world around
them.
* Diagnosis: 1 in 36 (previously 1 in 100), more males than
females.
* But female diagnoses increasing (differing characteristics; male
bias in autism research).
Autism is NOT:
- an illness, or something to be ‘cured’
- caused by vaccines
- caused by bad parenting
It is still not clear what causes Autism or if
there even is a cause:
- genetics
- environment (eg older parent age,
pregnancy complications)
- gene <> environment interactions
autism is a spectrum condition
- circular spectrum like a colour wheel-
- better range of skills so they can be appreciated
- diverse symptoms from person to person
autism terminology
- there are appropriate terms used to describe or talk to someone/ about someone if they are autistic
characteristics of autism
Sensory processing differences (vision, sound, touch, taste, smell).
Hypersensitivity > Stress, anxiety, physical pain
Obsession, repetitive behaviours, routines.
Source of enjoyment. But limits other activities.
Resistance to change.
Differences organizing, sequencing, and
prioritizing activities. Processing information,
predicting consequences of actions, concept of time, detail-focused.
Behavior.
Self-injury, physical risks to
others.
Differences in Social Behaviour,
Verbal and Nonverbal
Communication, and Imagination.
how is autism diagnosed
- DISCO (diagnostic interview for social and communication disorders)
- ADOS (autism diagnostic observations schedule)
- ADI-R (autism diagnostic interview- revised)
Indian scale for assessment of autism (ISAA)
cultural differences affect autistic diagnoses
play and autism
- Object organisation.
- Preference to play alone.
- Repetitive, seemingly purposeless to (non-autistic) others but not to the child.
- Don’t abide by typical rules of shared play.
- Less symbolic play.
Note! This is not true
for all autistic
children. Everyone is
different.
play and autism- the role of imitation
Imitation emerges early and serves 2 (related)
functions:
(1) a learning mechanism through which
infants gain new skills and knowledge about
the world;
(2) a social function through which they
engage in social and emotional exchanges
with others.
The ability to imitate functional and symbolic
actions is related to the development of play
skills.
Ingersoll (2008)
play and autism- the role of imitation cont
- Autistic children show differences in frequency and nature of imitation skills.
- Actions on objects; Manual and posture / body movements; Facial imitation (eg expression)
- Reduced visual attention to social (and non-social) things.
- Preference for objects vs faces.
- Concerns that early imitation differences negatively affect social interactions with others, and thus social learning opportunities.
- However, mixed evidence for imitation differences among autistic children.
- Type of task; autism characteristics (diverse spectrum), age of participants; sensory effects of objects used.
pretend play and autism
- considered to be really useful and also an opportunity to develop various social cognition language
- Pretend play promotes cognitive, social, language, and emotional development.
- Lack of pretend / symbolic play is a key clinical assessment feature of autism in childhood
pretend play and autism cont
Functional > Pretend play
* Tendency for literal and rigid use of object functions.
* Symbolic/pretend play involves non-literal actions and beliefs (also elements of imitation).
* In more structured and directed play with objects, autistic children do produce different pretend acts with the same object/toy.
* Instead autistic children show reduced complexity, creativity, flexibility of pretend play. Need more external facilitation.
theoretical viewpoints
two hypothesis:
(1) Social Cognition Deficit
(2) Social Motivation Theory
social cognition deficit
- Generation of ‘meta-representations’ important in pretend play.
- Understanding different thoughts and feelings releases child from original representation to create a new one > Theory of Mind (ToM).
- But research remains unclear on the exact role and contribution of ToM role within pretend play.
- Criticisms of joint attention and traditional false belief tasks, measures too crude (Lin et al., 2017).
the role of theory of mind
- Lin et al (2017) used improved methodologies
- Show that ToM positively predicts the elaborateness of pretend play.
- Conclude that ToM predicts ‘quality’ and not quantity of pretend play in autistic children.
ToM Task Battery (TOMTB): emotion recognition, desire-based emotion, seeing
leads to knowing, line of sight, perception-based action, standard false belief,
belief- and reality-based emotion and second order emotion, message-desire
discrepancy, and second-order false belief. Appropriate for verbal and nonverbal
autistic children.
Child Initiated Pretend Play Assessment (ChIPPA): child’s ability to self-initiate and sustain pretend play over a period of 30 min. - But evidence that autistic children can understand pretend play that they observe in others.
So the difference may lie in the production of pretend play rather than the ability to understand non-literal behaviours in others. A preference not a deficit?
social motivation theory
Non-autistic children motivated by social
feedback.
* Eye contact and shared
attention/experience can be socially
rewarding (Schilbach et al., 2010).
Autistic children can find sensory
feedback more rewarding and may
imitate more if that is involved.
social motivation theory cont
- Autistic children may have intact ability to pretend,
but do not translate this into action. - Reduced interest and reluctance to engage in pretend play.
- It is a personal choice rather than a ‘deficit’.
three manifestations of social interest
Social Orienting: things with social importance often receive prioritised attention.
- Core diagnostic criteria for autism in babies and toddlers include infrequent orienting to own name, reduced eye contact, engage less with other people.
Seeking & Liking: Social interactions can be
rewarding. Suggested less so in autistic individuals.
- Less spontaneous helping and collaborative behaviours.
- Fewer friends but not ‘lonely’.
- Fewer initiations and bids for joint attention (eg declarative pointing).
- Social anhedonia in autistic adolescents (lack of feelings of pleasure in some social interactions and behaviours).
Social Maintenance: Desire
to maintain and enhance relationships.
- Fewer spontaneous greetings or goodbyes, less small talk.
- Less strategic control of emotions or behaviours with others. But see also ‘masking’ (highly frequent behaviour adaptation to blend in – strategic control)
double empathy theory
Reciprocal difficulties in
understanding that can occur
between people who hold different
norms and expectations of each
other and have different
communication styles.
