A comparative study of sensory processing in children with and without Autism Spectrum Disorder in the home and classroom environments.
Teachers see more sensory and praxis issues in autistic students than parents see at home, so gather both SPM forms before you plan treatment.
01Research in Context
What this study did
The team compared kids with and without autism. They used the Sensory Processing Measure at home and at school.
Parents and teachers each filled out the same form. The goal was to see if the two groups differ and whether raters agree.
What they found
Children with autism scored much higher on sensory, social, and praxis problems. Teachers rated these problems as more severe than parents did.
The gap between raters was largest for praxis and social participation items.
How this fits with other research
Stichter et al. (2009) saw the same split on an earlier form, but they did not test two settings. Fernández-Andrés et al. (2015) adds the home-classroom angle.
Aller et al. (2023) looked at Down syndrome and other delays. They also found caregiver and direct-observation scores that did not line up. The 2015 autism-only paper and the 2023 wider sample both warn: one rater is not enough.
Simpson et al. (2019) dug deeper into the autism group alone. They used a short form and found two sensory subtypes. Their work builds on the 2015 finding that scores vary by informant and shows why you should probe further.
Why it matters
Always collect SPM forms from both parents and teachers before you write a sensory goal. If the teacher reports bigger problems, use school-based probes and add environmental supports there first. The difference is real, not error.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Sensory processing and higher integrative functions impairments are highly prevalent in children with ASD. Context should be considered in analyzing the sensory profile and higher integrative functions. The main objective of this study is to compare sensory processing, social participation and praxis in a group of 79 children (65 males and 14 females) from 5 to 8 years of age (M=6.09) divided into two groups: ASD Group (n=41) and Comparison Group (n=38). The Sensory Processing Measure (SPM) was used to evaluate the sensory profile of the children: parents reported information about their children's characteristics in the home environment, and teachers reported information about the same characteristics in the classroom environment. The ASD Group obtained scores that indicate higher levels of dysfunction on all the assessed measures in both environments, with the greatest differences obtained on the social participation and praxis variables. The most affected sensory modalities in the ASD Group were hearing and touch. Only in the ASD Group were significant differences found between the information reported by parents and what was reported by teachers: specifically, the teachers reported greater dysfunction than the parents in social participation (p=.000), touch (p=.003) and praxis (p=.010). These results suggest that the context-specific qualities found in children with ASD point out the need to receive information from both parents and teachers during the sensory profile assessment process, and use context-specific assessments.
Research in developmental disabilities, 2015 · doi:10.1016/j.ridd.2014.12.034