In 2011, OAR’s Scientific Council selected seven applied research projects for funding. This month, we describe the seventh study, which is being conducted by a researcher at UCLA.
Effectiveness of a Virtual Coach Application in Social Skills Training for Teens with ASD
Elizabeth A. Laugeson, PhD, University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA)
This research study will test a novel and innovative social coaching method using the PEERS Virtual Coach, an iPhone/iPad/iPod app that will promote social coaching and instruction using skills from the PEERS curriculum, an evidence-based 14-week manualized, social skills training intervention.
Social and communication deficits appear to be the most prevalent issues for teens with autism spectrum disorders (ASD), often leading to problems with independence and psychosocial functioning. An evidence-based, parent-assisted, manualized social skills treatment known as PEERS has shown efficacy in three clinical trials for transitional youth with ASD. Significant improvements were reported in overall social skills, social responsiveness, frequency of peer interactions, empathy, social skills knowledge and use, and decreased loneliness.
Participants will be recruited from the UCLA PEERS Clinic, The Help Group (a large nonprofit agency serving children with ASD and their families), and other local community mental health agencies. Approximately 30 adolescents with ASD and their caregivers will participate in this study.
The Program for the Education and Enrichment of Relationship Skills (PEERS) intervention is an evidence-based 14-week manualized, social skills training intervention for adolescents and young adults that targets the friendship skills of adolescents with ASD.
Treatment protocol in the adolescent group will consist of weekly 90-minute treatment sessions, which will begin with a 30-minute homework review, followed by a 30-minute didactic social skills lesson, utilizing the teaching methods of modeling and role-playing. In order to practice the newly learned social skills in a contained environment, participants will end the session with a behavioral rehearsal interaction, which will last for approximately 20 minutes. Socialization homework assignments designed to address further mastery and generalization of newly learned skills within the natural social environment (i.e., home, community, and school settings) will be assigned. Weekly handouts with summaries of the social skills discussed in each session will be distributed to parents.
Parents will also participate in weekly 90-minute treatment sessions held concurrently with the adolescent sessions in a different room. The sessions will begin with a 60-minute homework review, followed by a 20-minute review of a parent handout outlining the social skills lesson being presented to the adolescents with tips on providing social coaching of these skills. The remaining 10 minutes of the sessions will be spent with parents and teens together for a lesson summary, outline of the socialization homework assignments, and individual sessions to discuss completion of the homework assignments.
Participants in the Virtual Coach application group will receive support and additional explanation of the use of the Virtual Coach in completion of a given homework assignment for the week.
The Virtual Coach application consists of a menu of lesson plans based on the PEERS intervention. Each lesson will have a list of newly learned skills and descriptors of how and when these skills should be used during social engagements. For example, prior to organizing a get-together with friends, teens using the Virtual Coach will review the steps for planning a get-together in their mobile device (i.e., figure out who is going to be there, when the get-together is going to happen, where the get-together will take place, and what they plan to do).
The teens will have the option of viewing embedded video role-play demonstrations of these skills to further promote successful implementation.
The Virtual Coach tool allows teens to use widely available technology to receive social coaching instruction, without the presence of live coaches, to avoid artificial context in peer-to-peer socialization. The Virtual Coach app will be installed on an iPhone, iPod, or iPad device.
Dr. Laugeson is a licensed clinical psychologist and a clinical instructor in the Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences at the UCLA Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior. She is the director of The Help Group – UCLA Autism Research Alliance, director of the UCLA PEERS Program, and co-developer of the PEERS intervention. Her current clinical and research interests are in social skills training for adolescents and adults with ASD.
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