Technical Review of Published Research on Applied Behaviour Analysis Interventions for People with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Results

Reporting on results of our review by Ministry of Education target categories

Table 5 shows the required organisation of the review as specified by the Ministry of Education and the equivalent (or best fit) National Standards Project (NSP) classifications of the evidence divided by targeted areas for intervention. The extent to which NSP and Ministry categories match is discussed at the start of each section of the results and in the Discussion section.

The writers of Result Sections 1 to 8 (Table 5) were supplied with the NSP Strength of Evidence Classification System (SECS) tables (described in Table 4) and Excel spreadsheets containing evidence tables with NSP and NZ-unique data for their particular category. These evidence tables contained data only on items published from 1998-2007 with Scientific Merit Rating Scale (SMRS) scores ≥ 2.0. Each produced a succinct report using the standardised headings and methods, as follows.

1. Introduction: Explained how the Ministry of Education category was addressed by one or more NSP categories. 
2. Evidence from NSP review: Described evidence from SECS ratings across different behavioural intervention categories (Table 2) relevant to the section. 
3. Additional evidence from New Zealand reviewers: Included description of additional data provided from New Zealand-unique items, i.e., the extent to which additional data may have changed NSP’s findings. (See Appendix C for data and Appendix D1 for references) 
4. Evidence from studies published from 1998-2007: Data contained in section writers’ spreadsheets were reviewed and indications given for strength of evidence concerning the use of behavioural methods to alleviate behavioural deficits (sections 1 – 5) or reduce behavioural excesses (sections 6 & 7) or both excesses and deficits (section 8) when only 1998 – 2007 articles were included. 
5. Brief summary of section.

The writers of Results Sections 9 and 10 took a different approach since the data they reviewed derived from all of the items in the NSP and NZ-unique evidence tables, across all categories of intervention type and intervention targets. They were instructed to report on the extent to which generalisation (or maintenance) had been addressed by experimental design and method and to review generalisation and maintenance effects for the items recorded in the original NZ-unique database of 91 items with SMRS >2.0. This represents 18% (91/508) of the SMRS composite > 2.0 of NSP and NZ databases combined. The reason for non-inclusion of review of generalization and maintenance effects from the NSP database is explained at the beginning of these sections.

Motor skills were assessed in only four items with SMRS > 2.0 published in 1998-2007. In no case were motor skills specifically targeted for change, but were assessed routinely as part of comprehensive Vineland assessments. Since the vast majority of behaviours (the subject matter of ABA) involve fine and/or gross physical movement, most categories of behaviour targeted for improvement could be viewed as motor behaviours. We believe that interventions that aim to target these skills directly have not used ABA methods or, if they have, none of the research studies met our inclusion criteria. Possibly, since motor skills deficits are not defining features of ASD, there has been little research interest in addressing them. For these reasons, and with prior agreement from the Ministry of Education (7th October, 2008), we have not produced a review of ABA interventions targeting motor skills specifically.