The Use of Rapid Motor Imitation Antecedent Training For Increasing Spoken Phonology In Minimally Speaking Autistic Preschoolers

Many children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) fail to acquire spoken language (Tager-Flusberg & Kasari, 2013) with spoken language predicting positive outcomes (Tager-Flusberg, 2016). Thus, the more evidence-based interventions available to clinicians, the more likely these children will acquire language. This project proposes to evaluate the effectiveness of Rapid Motor Imitation Antecedent Training (RMIA) for improving speech production in preschoolers with ASD. Twenty children, 3-4 years, diagnosed with ASD and exhibiting restricted spoken phonemic repertoires, will be recruited from early intervention programs. Participants will be randomly assigned to either an immediate treatment group or a delayed treatment group. The delayed treatment group will act as the control group. Each participant will complete a pre-treatment evaluation that includes a developmental assessment measuring nonverbal problem solving, motor and language skills, a standardized articulation test along with a speech production sample that will be phonetically transcribed. The intervention will consist of RMIA sessions conducted three times a week for 45-minutes over a 12-week period. An additional speech sample will be collected and transcribed following treatment to be used as the outcome measure. To evaluate the effects of treatment, pre- and post-treatment speech samples from the treatment and delayed (control) groups will be compared using repeated measures t-tests. It is hypothesized that the treatment group will add a greater number of phonemes to their repertoire compared to the delayed (control) group. Successful implementation of this intervention could provide an additional clinical tool for improving spoken language outcomes among children with ASD