Functional Reading Activities to Motivate and Empower for Young Adults With Intellectual or Developmental Disabilities: A Randomized Pilot Trial.

Purpose: Reading proficiency is an important life skill that contributes to improved quality of life and becoming an active member in society. This pilot randomized clinical trial tested the effects of a functional literacy intervention in young adults with intellectual and/or developmental disabilities (IDDs).

Method: Participants included 44 young adults with IDD between 18 and 26 years old. Participants were randomly assigned to the Functional Reading Activities to Motivate and Empower (FRAME) treatment group or a "business-as-usual" control group. Participants participated in 24 twice-weekly sessions in which they were taught reading comprehension strategies in the context of functional text stimuli or activities of daily living that require reading (e.g., text messages, e-mails). The primary outcome measure was the number of reading comprehension strategies used. Secondary outcomes included (a) multiple-choice comprehension questions, (b) text message response, (c) e-mail response, (d) summarization, and (e) verbal responses to functional text samples.

Results: Young adults with IDD in the treatment group made statistically significant gains in use of reading comprehension strategies (d = 1.09, p = .002) and multiple-choice comprehension questions (d = 0.79, p = .038) as compared with the control group. There were no statistically significant differences on the remaining outcome measures.

Conclusions: This study provides preliminary support for the short-term effects of the FRAME intervention for young adults with IDD, with particular emphasis on explicit reading comprehension strategy instruction within a functional context. Therapeutic services typically end during the transition period for young adults with disabilities. However, it is essential that evidence-based literacy supports are available as this is a skill that continues to develop throughout the lifespan and has the potential to transform an individual's transition to adulthood and independence. Future research should include a larger clinical trial and evaluate mediators of intervention effects.