A program for increasing manual signing by autistic and profoundly retarded youth within the daily environment.
Teach signs right inside daily routines—gains stick for months with no extra drills.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Nine non-speaking youth with autism and severe ID lived in a state hospital.
Staff taught manual signs during normal routines like meals, chores, and play.
Adults waited for the child to look, then modeled the sign and gave the item.
What they found
Every teen learned at least 18 new signs in 12 weeks.
Skills stayed strong 5 and 17 weeks later with no extra teaching.
Some kids also started making new sounds, others did not.
How this fits with other research
Bonvillian et al. (1981) ran a near-copy study one year earlier with adults. Both show staff can run sign lessons on the ward and wins last almost a year.
Gentry et al. (1980) tried sign-plus-speech with one preschooler and saw faster gains. Their total-communication idea adds spoken words while you sign.
Doherty et al. (2018) swapped signs for PECS pictures and added peer partners. Same goal—more child initiations—new tool.
Abdi et al. (2023) packed many language tricks into 16 sessions and got huge vocabulary jumps. Their bundle updates the 1982 sign-only plan for today’s clinics.
Why it matters
You do not need a separate table-time block to grow language. Put the child’s favorite items in clear bins, wait for a glance, model the sign, and hand it over. Do this across snacks, play, and chores. Five months later you may still see the signs with no extra work.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
A program was implemented to increase the manual signing of five profoundly retarded and four autistic youth within their daily environment. Each participant was nonvocal or minimally vocal. The program was based on modified incidental teaching strategies and was implemented by direct care personnel under supervision in an institutional setting. Specific components included rearranging the physical environment to prompt signing, altering routine staff-resident interactions to prompt, manually guide and/or reinforce signing; and conducting mini-training sessions. Additionally, staff modeled signs intermittently throughout the day. The program was sequentially implemented during two staff work shifts on each of two resident living modules. Observations conducted at four separate time periods during the day indicated that significant increases in signing occurred for all participating youth and that the increases generally maintained during follow-up checks at 5 and 17 weeks. Differential effects of the increased signing on frequency of vocalizations were noted across residents. A staff acceptability survey indicated favorable staff reports on the usefulness of signing to communicate with the youth. Results are discussed regarding the significance of manual signing for seriously developmentally disabled persons and the importance of ensuring that signing skills are used in the daily environment and not exclusively in formal training sessions. Also, areas for continued research are noted in terms of more refined analyses of client skills and subsequent progress in manual communication programs.
Journal of applied behavior analysis, 1982 · doi:10.1901/jaba.1982.15-363