Measuring Developmental Outcomes in Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD)

Abstract

The purpose of the study was to generate a behavioral-developmental scale and see how well it predicted performance in the participants diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Forty-two children diagnosed with ASD were given a behavioral-developmental instrument, Autism Developmental Task Sequence (ADTS). The instrument was found to be a very good predictor of how developmentally difficult the task items were. The correlation between Order of Hierarhical Complexity (OHC) of the items and Rasch score was extremely strong, r(43) = .892, p = .000. The instrument was also found to be a very good predictor of performance. The mean stage of performance was M = 4.26, SD = 2.36. The age range and mean stage of performance of the sample did not line up with the age and stage distribution of normal population (Commons & Rodriguez, 1993). With the instrument, we were able to show the development sequence cross sectionally. This information is useful for knowing where to intervene and to measure effectiveness of intervention over a reasonable period.