孤独症碎镜理论述评

孤独症是泛指一大类在社会交往、沟通方面存在功能缺陷的疾病, 至今病因尚未阐明。“碎镜理论”作为孤独症研究领域的新兴理论, 在神经—认知层面较先前理论更为全面地解释了孤独症的各种临床行为表现, 并为这些异常行为间的相互关系提供了一种统一性的研究视角。文章首先对镜像神经元的发现进行了简介, 在此基础上对碎镜理论的由来及其与孤独症相关功能(包括动作识别与模仿、心理理论、共情以及语言理解)缺陷的关系进行了综述, 最后通过区分主动模仿和自动模仿, 就镜像神经元系统及其调控系统与孤独症关系中存在的问题进行了反思与展望。     

孤独症的认知障碍研究及其评述

执行功能紊乱理论(Theory of Executive Dysfunction)、弱的中央统合理论(Weak Central Coherence theory)和心理理论假说(The Theory of Mind Hypothesis)是解释孤独症认知障碍的三种重要理论。本文着重通过回顾以往的实验研究来探讨三种理论的产生、发展及前进的方向, 以及三大理论之间的关系。三者可能从不同侧面诠释了孤独症认知障碍的机制, 如何综合起来更好地揭示孤独症的认知障碍和病理机制, 尚需深入和全面的研究。同时更多地考虑不同认知因素的交互影响以及研究的生态学效度, 可能是进一步研究需要考虑的问题。     

孤独症儿童共同注意的神经基础及早期干预

共同注意是指两个人共同对某一事物加以注意, 分享对该事物的兴趣, 它是儿童社会认知发展的奠基性能力。首先, 孤独症儿童共同注意发展主要体现在注视转换、主动展示、分享等能力发展滞后及缺陷; 孤独症儿童共同注意的神经基础：应答性共同注意主要涉及后部皮层注意网络(如颞上沟后部、顶内沟等), 自发性共同注意涉及前部皮层注意网络(如前扣带皮层、背内侧额叶等); 最后, 以回合式教法和关键反应训练为基本方法, 论述了共同注意干预的新近模式和效果评估。未来研究应在孤独症儿童的共同注意发展的年龄特征及机制、共同注意的脑区可塑性及脑网络的发展以及开发更有效的干预方法等方面展开大量研究。     

An exploratory analysis of task-interspersal procedures while teaching object labels to children with autism

Research has demonstrated that interspersing mastered tasks with new tasks facilitates learning under certain conditions; however, little is known about factors that influence the effectiveness of this treatment strategy. The initial purpose of the current investigation was to evaluate the effects of similar versus dissimilar interspersed tasks while teaching object labels to children diagnosed with autism or developmental delays. We then conducted a series of exploratory analyses involving the type of reinforcer delivered for correct responses on trials with unknown or known object labels. Performance was enhanced under the interspersal condition only when either brief praise was delivered for all correct responses or presumably more preferred reinforcers were provided for performance on known trials rather than on unknown trials.     

Teaching children with autism to respond to and initiate bids for joint attention

A multiple baseline design across 3 children with autism was used to assess the effects of prompting and social reinforcement to teach participants to respond to an adult's bid for joint attention and to initiate bids for joint attention. Participants were taught to respond to an adult's bid for joint attention by looking in the direction of an object at which the adult pointed, by making a comment about the object, and by looking back at the adult. Additional training and reinforcement were needed to teach the participants to initiate bids for joint attention. Findings are discussed in terms of the social relevance of teaching children with autism to respond to and initiate bids for joint attention.     

Further evaluation of a brief, intensive teacher-training model

The purpose of this study was to further evaluate the outcomes of a model program that was designed to train current teachers of children with autism. Nine certified special education teachers participating in an intensive 5-day summer training program were taught a relatively large number of specific skills in two areas (preference assessment and direct teaching). The teachers met the mastery criteria for all of the skills during the summer training. Follow-up observations up to 6 months after training suggested that the skills generalized to their classrooms and were maintained for most teachers with brief feedback only.     

Why Levelling Down could be Worse for Prioritarianism than for Egalitarianism

Derek Parfit has argued that, in contrast to prioritarianism, egalitarianism is exposed to the levelling down objection, i.e., the objection that it is absurd that a change which consists merely in the betteroff losing some of their well-being should be in one way for the better. In reply, this paper contends that (1) there is a plausible form of egalitarianism which is equivalent to another form of prioritarianism than the Parfitian one, a relational rather than an absolute form of prioritarianism, and that (2), although this relational or egalitarian form of prioritarianism is hit by the levelling down objection, the Parfitian form is also hit by it, or worse objections, if it is fully worked out.

Imitative interaction increases social interest and elicited imitation in non‐verbal children with autism

Recent studies indicate that being intensely imitated for a brief period of time increases social interest among children with autism. The aim of this study was to replicate and extend these findings. Twenty children with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) were randomly assigned to one of two interaction strategies: imitation (n=10) or contingent (n=10). The children had little or no functional speech, and their developmental age averaged 25 months (mean chronological age =6:5 years). Both conditions were presented with repeated sessions of a modified version of Nadel's ‘still‐face’ paradigm (still‐face/intervention/still‐face/spontaneous play). The analysis revealed a significant increase of both proximal and distal social behaviours (touch and look at person) for the imitation condition, which confirms previous reports. In addition, an increase in elicited imitation, as measured with the PEP‐R developmental assessment procedure, was also observed for children in the imitation condition, but not in the contingent condition. This finding extends earlier reports in that it suggests that the social expectancies unlocked by imitation also spread to tasks outside the experimental setting. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Putting the power of behavior analysis in the hands of nonbehavioral professionals: Toward a blueprint for dissemination†

Behavior analysts have much to offer nonbehavioral professionals who work with the communities that we serve. Successful dissemination of behavior-analytic technologies to these professionals could potentially improve their practice. Although the literature contains some exemplary examples of successful dissemination, our discipline would benefit from a blueprint for conducting this important work. In this article, I share our experiences disseminating behavioral technologies to educators, law enforcement officers, and health care providers who engage with neurodiverse individuals. These experiences form the basis of a recommended blueprint for dissemination, which awaits empirical support. After describing this tentative blueprint, I provide suggestions for future research on how best to disseminate our technologies to nonbehavioral professionals, the ideal content of those dissemination activities, and the conditions under which professionals may be more likely to embed our technologies into their best practices.     

Attention, Joint Attention, and Social Cognition

ABSTRACT— Before social cognition there is joint processing of information about the attention of self and others. This joint attention requires the integrated activation of a distributed cortical network involving the anterior and posterior attention systems. In infancy, practice with the integrated activation of this distributed attention network is a major contributor to the development of social cognition. Thus, the functional neuroanatomies of social cognition and the anterior–posterior attention systems have much in common. These propositions have implications for understanding joint attention, social cognition, and autism.