A Positive behavioural Intervention on Prospective Memory of Children with Autism

Abstract

Prospective memory is remembering to carry out a behaviour on a particular occasion or at a specific point in time in the future. This form of memory is particularly critical for the daily functioning of children with Autism Spectrum Disorder and their functional independence from their caregivers. My first aim was to assess the prospective memory abilities of each child when completing virtual week. My second aim was to investigate if reinforcing the prospective remembering of children with Autism Spectrum Disorder increased the probability of those behaviours occurring again. Four children with a diagnosis of ASD participated in a computerised board game called 'Virtual Week'. Using a single-subject design, baseline, positive reinforcement, and maintenance or prompt phases were implemented for each child. For every correct prospective memory response in the positive reinforcement phase, they received positive reinforcement. Positive reinforcement increased the accuracy of prospective memory responses for all participants. Data for all participants showed a decrease in missed responses and an increase in correct responses to the prospective memory tasks. These effects were maintained after reinforcement was discontinued for three out of four children. This is the first study of which I was aware to use a behavioural behavioural intervention to improve the prospective memory behaviours of children with ASD. reinforcing prospective remembering in real-life situations using say-do correspondence training could extend research in this area.