The Effectiveness of Reciprocal Imitation Training on Reducing Symptoms of Children with Autism Disorder

Abstract

The purpose of this study was investigating the effectiveness of Reciprocal Imitation Training (RIT) on reducing symptoms of children with autism disorder.Twenty four autistic children (30-54 months old) were selected from a rehabilitation center in Tehran and assigned randomly in to two equal groups of experimental and control groups. The experimental group received 70 sessions (3 days per week, 20 minutes for each session) of RIT through the intervention. The GARZ questionnaire was used as the pre-test and the post-test for the two groups. ANCOVA analysis showed that there were significant differences between mean scores of autisticsymptoms (social interaction, communication and stereotype movements) in two groups. This study provides evidence for the effectiveness of naturalistic behavioral interventionfor improving autistic symptoms in young autistic children.

Keywords

• autism
• reciprocal imitation training
• autistic symptoms