Effectiveness of Group Play Therapy on the Communication of 5-8 Years Old Children With High Functioning Autism

Abstract

Objective Communication deficiency is one of the diagnostic criteria for autism, which leads to difficulty in\rlearning speech and linguistic skills. Nowadays, it is common to use play therapy for supporting children with\rautism. Play therapy is an active approach that helps a child to reveal his conscious and unconscious feelings\rthrough playing. The present study aimed to determine the effectiveness of group play therapy on the communication\rskills of children with high functioning autism.\rMaterials & Methods The present research was an experimental study, including a pretest and posttest design\rwith a control group. Twelve 5-8 years old boys with high functioning autism were selected purposively from\rthe Autism Charity Foundation in Tehran in 2013. All subjects were included according to get a diagnose of\rhigh functioning autism, literacy of parents to complete the questionnaire, lack of sensory disorders such as visual\ror auditory disorders, lack of physical or motor disorders such as cerebral palsy, not attending to the same\rplay therapy intervention program simultaneously. All subjects were assigned randomly to the experimental\rand control groups (6 children in each group). The experimental group participated in 20 sessions (three times\ra week; 45 to 60 minutes for each session) and received group play therapy along with the routine program\r(mental and physical occupational therapy, and speech therapy). However, the control group received only\rthe routine program. The communication skills of all the children were evaluated using the Gilliam Autism\rRating Scale (GARS) before, at 20th session, and 2 months after the intervention. The collected data from two\rsituations (pre-test, post-test) were analyzed by analysis of covariance. Repeated measure test was used to\rdetermine the lasting effect of group play therapy on the communication of boys after two months follow-up.\rResults The findings of the analysis of covariance showed that the group play therapy significantly influenced\rthe communication of male children with high functioning autism. In addition, it was found that the effects\rof the group play therapy lasted significantly on the communication skills of the children even at two months\rfollow-up (P<0.001).\rConclusion It is concluded that the group play therapy can help the children to understand and communicate\rwell. This therapy can be used as a complementary training and therapeutic method for children with high\rfunctioning autism to help improve their communication deficiencies.