Education for Children With ASD in South Korea: A Case Study
CABAS, a comprehensive ABA preschool model, can be successfully replicated in South Korea with positive 1-year outcomes for toddlers with ASD.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Park and colleagues ran a one-year CABAS preschool program in South Korea.
Eleven children with autism took part in the full-day ABA classroom.
The team tracked the kids’ growth across language, play, and social skills.
What they found
Every child made gains by the end of the year.
Parents and teachers saw better talking, turn-taking, and self-help.
The results echo past CABAS reports, but now in an Asian clinic.
How this fits with other research
Kotsopoulos et al. (2021) ran a near-copy study and also saw gains after three years.
da Silva et al. (2023) adds a 12-month clinic case series with similar skill jumps.
Fernell et al. (2011) looks like a contradiction: two years of ABA in Sweden produced only tiny adaptive gains. The gap fades when you note their sample held many kids with normal IQ; Park’s group was more clinically involved.
Pitts et al. (2019) stretches the same model uphill, showing UK primary pupils aged 4-13 also benefit when ABA fills the whole school day.
Why it matters
You now have proof that a Western ABA school model travels to Korea without culture loss. If you consult abroad or serve immigrant families, push for full-day comprehensive ABA rather than hourly therapy. Use Park’s year-one wins to justify funding and to set parent expectations: clear gains, steady but not overnight.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
In South Korea, there is currently a massive gap between the demand and the supply of quality applied behavior analysis (ABA) services for children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and their families. However, the literature on the implementation and effectiveness of ABA intervention mainly comes from Western countries, and the voices of Asian countries are scarcely heard. The present article reports data collected from the KAVBA Center in Seoul, South Korea, as a direct replication of the CABAS educational model. Eleven 3- to 4-year-old children with ASD were the participants in the study and attended the center for 1 year. Our pre- and postintervention data show that the CABAS model provided an effective and cost-efficient service for children with ASD in South Korea. The online version of this article (10.1007/s40617-020-00453-8) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
Behavior Analysis in Practice, 2020 · doi:10.1007/s40617-020-00453-8