An evaluation of individually delivered secret agent society social skills program for children with high-functioning autism spectrum disorders: A pilot study

© The Author(s) 2015. High-functioning children with autism spectrum disorders display social skill deficits that can have a debilitating impact on their daily lives. The Secret Agent Society (SAS) program has been shown to be effective in improving the social skills of these children when delivered...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Tan, Y., Mazzucchelli, Trevor, Beaumont, R.
Format: Journal Article
Published: Cambridge University Press 2015
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/32573
Description
Summary:© The Author(s) 2015. High-functioning children with autism spectrum disorders display social skill deficits that can have a debilitating impact on their daily lives. The Secret Agent Society (SAS) program has been shown to be effective in improving the social skills of these children when delivered in a group setting. This pilot study evaluated whether individually delivered SAS would yield similar outcomes. Three participants were recruited for the 9-week intervention. Measures of social competence were administered at four points: pretest 1, pretest 2, post-intervention, and 6-week follow-up. Participants showed significant improvement in half of the measures assessing social competence. On a third of these measures, two participants demonstrated improvements to within the range of their typically developing peers. Follow-up results suggested that improvements were maintained at 6 weeks' post-intervention. Limitations of this study and directions for future research are discussed.