Curtin researchers have successfully completed a pilot study of a world-leading Swedish social skills training program for autistic adolescents, adapted to meet the needs of autistic teenagers in Australia.<\/p>\n
The Curtin Autism Research Group in collaboration with the Autism Association of Western Australia and the Karolinska Institute for Neurodevelopmental Disorders in Sweden translated the KONTAKT program into English and adapted it to Australian culture before evaluating its feasibility and acceptability with a group of WA autistic teenagers.<\/p>\n
The research, published in the Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders <\/em>and funded by the Stan Perron Charitable Foundation, found the adapted version of the training program successfully improved communication and social interaction skills for the study\u2019s WA participants.<\/p>\n Research author Professor Sonya Girdler, Director of the Curtin Autism Research Group, said the 17 study participants undertook a series of training sessions covering increasingly more complex social skills such as understanding social rules and relationships, recognising emotions and developing conversational skills.<\/p>\n \u201cWe evaluated changes in social goals, symptom severity, quality of life, interpersonal efficacy, social anxiety, loneliness, and facial emotion recognition prior to the program and then immediately and three months after it,\u201d Professor Girdler said.<\/p>\n \u201cThe findings indicated the KONTAKT program supports Australian autistic adolescents in achieving personally meaningful social goals, with participants not only gaining important social skills to draw on for their entire lives but having fun while benefitting from meeting other young people with autism.<\/p>\n \u201cThis project has brought a world-leading social skills training intervention to autistic teenagers in WA and this study provides the foundation for our future work, which will look more closely at how this program works in a larger group of autistic teenagers.\u201d<\/p>\n Stan Perron Charitable Foundation Executive Chair Elizabeth Perron said the KONTAKT program was a great example of why her father first established the Charitable Foundation.<\/p>\n \u201cHe took great satisfaction from seeing how particular initiatives and programs funded by the Foundation were making a genuine difference to young lives,\u201d Ms Perron said.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are delighted to maintain our association with KONTAKT and look forward to seeing the ongoing benefits it provides in assisting participants in the program to enjoy the best quality of life possible.\u201d<\/p>\n