A community-based early intervention program for toddlers with autism spectrum disorders.
Weekly parent coaching in the home boosts toddler eye contact and verbal back-and-forth within a community early-intervention model.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Rollins et al. (2016) tested a parent-coaching program called Pathways Early Autism Intervention. Toddlers with autism got weekly home visits for six months. Parents learned to prompt eye contact, wait for sounds, and play face-to-face.
The team used a multiple-baseline design. They tracked each child’s eye contact, words, and turn-taking before and after coaching began.
What they found
Kids looked longer at faces and talked back more after parents used the Pathways steps. Non-verbal turn-taking did not change.
Parents, not therapists, drove the gains. The model worked inside a regular community early-intervention office.
How this fits with other research
Rollins et al. (2020) ran the same Pathways program but added a mutual-gaze module in a randomized trial. Their toddlers also gained social and adaptive skills, lifting the evidence from small pilots to RCT level.
Schertz et al. (2016) pooled 38 early-autism studies and found the biggest language leaps when both clinician and parent deliver treatment. Rosenthal’s home-only parent format matches that ingredient list.
Perez et al. (2015) gave community-based PRT plus parent training a year earlier. Both papers show community agencies can teach parents naturalistic tactics, but Pathways targets younger toddlers and focuses on social reciprocity rather than broad cognitive gains.
Why it matters
If you coach parents to prompt eye contact and wait for sounds during daily play, toddlers with autism talk more and look more. You can embed these brief Pathways loops into existing home visits without extra staff. Start with one toy, one wait, and one shared smile.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
This study examined Pathways Early Autism Intervention, a community-based, parent-mediated, intensive behavioral and developmental intervention program for children with autism spectrum disorders that could be used as a model for state-funded early intervention programs. A single-subject, multiple-baseline, across-participants design was used. Four boys with autism spectrum disorder and their mothers participated. Interventionists made weekly home visits and worked with caregivers to establish and maintain face-to-face reciprocal social interaction and eye contact. Each session included a 10-min video of parent-child interaction. Evidence of intervention effectiveness was measured by percentage of nonoverlapping data points. Social validity was measured using questionnaire items in regard to parents' perception of the intervention. The intervention was effective for the measures of eye contact, social engagement, and verbal reciprocity but not for nonverbal turn taking. Parents perceived the intervention as beneficial and easy to learn and incorporate into daily life.
Autism : the international journal of research and practice, 2016 · doi:10.1177/1362361315577217