Joint Attention Intervention

Review of Literature
Brian Garland
Saint Xavier University
Introduction
With its growing rate of incidence and consequential publicity and attention, autism is a major topic of discussion within the field of education. While the cause of autism is still yet to be discovered, we can, in the meantime, focus on how to help those already with a diagnosis of autism. Autism is characterized by social, communicative, and behavioral deficits with the vast spectrum of autism diagnoses ranging from extremely high functioning to severe and profound. One characteristic of autism is expressive language deficit. Meaningful language can be difficult for children with autism diagnoses to develop, with around 50% never expressing any
The literature to be reviewed is specifically that of joint attention intervention. The literature includes three quantitative research studies of joint attention with participants with autism diagnoses under 64 months of age and two analyses of various variables surrounding joint attention development of theories and interventions. This review of literature is to establish a framework and methodology for research related to joint attention and language outcomes; it is to better understand the variables, processes, and outcomes associated with joint attention and its
Kasari (2008) studied 58 children 3-4 years of age with a diagnosis of autism and no co-morbidity. Participants were randomly assigned to receive either joint attention (JA) intervention, symbolic play (SP) intervention, or no additional intervention for 30 minutes a day (Kasari, 2008, p. 129). All of the participants received 30 hours of ABA therapy per week at the same early intervention program. Kasari (2008) examined both expressive and receptive language outcomes from pre-intervention to 12 months post-intervention. Expressive language growth was significantly greater in the JA and SP intervention groups than it was in the control group while receptive language showed no significant growth (Kaale, 2012, p. 131). Not only was expressive language growth significantly greater during the interventions, but also 12 months post-intervention the JA and SP groups were still outperforming the control group (Kasari, 2008, p. 135). Interestingly in this study, the SP group actually slightly outperformed the JA group. However, children with “expressive language ages below 20 months...made greater language growth if they were randomized to the JA intervention than to the SP or control group” (Kasari, 2008, p.