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A Familiarization Protocol Facilitates the Participation of Children with ASD in Electrophysiological Research
Published on: July 31, 2017
Meta-analysis of Psychotherapy for Autistic Youth
Kashia A Rosenau1, Junok Kim2, An-Chuen Billy Cho2
1David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, USA. krosenau@mednet.ucla.edu.
Abstract:
In order to provide more individualized support, it is imperative to further understand the effectiveness of different types of psychotherapy on the clinical areas of need common in autistic youth (Wood et al. in Behav Ther 46:83-95, 2015). Randomized controlled trials of psychotherapy for autistic youth were included if published in English, included random assignment to treatment or control group, required a previous diagnosis of autism, had a mean age of 6-17 years, and provided outcome measure data from both intervention and control groups. A total of 133 measures were coded across 29 studies and included 1464 participants with a mean age of 10.39 years (1.89). A small mean effect size (0.38,95% CI [0.26, 0.47]) was found overall, with the largest effects for cognitive behavioral therapies on autism-related clinical needs (0.81) and overall mental health (0.78). The results show the significant impact of psychotherapy interventions for autistic youth. Additional research should further assess the details of the most effective psychotherapies for each area of clinical need.
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