A Randomized Controlled Study of Parent-assisted Children’s Friendship Training with Children having Autism Spectrum Disorders

This study evaluated Children’s Friendship Training (CFT), a manualized parent-assisted intervention to improve social skills among second to fifth grade children with autism spectrum disorders. Comparison was made with a delayed treatment control group (DTC). Targeted skills included conversational skills, peer entry skills, developing friendship networks, good sportsmanship, good host behavior during play dates, and handling teasing. At post-testing, the CFT group was superior to the DTC group on parent measures of social skill and play date behavior, and child measures of popularity and loneliness, At 3-month follow-up, parent measures showed significant improvement from baseline. Post-hoc analysis indicated more than 87% of children receiving CFT showed reliable change on at least one measure at post-test and 66.7% after 3 months follow-up

Parent-assisted Social Skills Training for adolescents with Autism Spectrum Disorders using the Chinese-Cantonese Version of the PEERS Program

High-functioning teenagers with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) often encounter difficulties in making friends. Using a randomized controlled trial, our data provided evidence that the Chinese-Cantonese version of the PEERS® program was effective in enhancing social skills knowledge, social communication and behaviors among teens with ASD in Hong Kong