Autism Spectrum Disorder Classroom Behavior Management

Autism Spectrum Disorder Classroom Behavior Management

Autism Spectrum Disorder Classroom Behavior Management

Introduction

The proposed research represents an inquiry about communication strategies used by autistic people, their “language” and the necessity of translation in order to relate to the “others”, the neurotypical, those who are outside the autistic spectrum. A qualitative research involving on-line interviews and self-narrative will help to comprehend the real meaning of communication impairment and why it is perceived as impairment by society. The written text and the Internet are the main tools of inquiry and a special focus is given to the written production within the autistic community. The dialogical dimension of autistic people thus becomes an important aspect of the research, in the attempt to investigate their style of interaction and way of improving social skills between professionals, parents and the autistic community. Discourse analysis will be applied to written transcripts of on-line interviews with special attention to the participants' sense of identity and the process of discovery of self.

Objective of Study

The research will focus mainly on the meaning given to on-line text based communication by high functioning autistic people and the way experiences are constructed on the Internet. This research project is an exploration of the personal world of people with Autistic Spectrum Disorder and the communication strategies used to express it. Understanding their different perception of the world and of their place in the world, we will be able in the future to facilitate their difficult school and social life and to develop better training for helping and support professionals.

Purpose of study

Keeping in mind the importance of dialogue in human interaction observed by Bakhtin (Holquist, 2002), communication skills become the key to enter social life and to construct experiences. The role of the researcher and psychologist therefore becomes a role of “translation” and interpretation of a different language, with the aim of improving social inclusion in schools (Carey, 2005), colleges and social life in general.

Scope of Study

The research scope also includes identity and perception of self in autistic people (Rapley, Kiernan & Antaki, 1998) and how identity can be expressed through on-line communication. Another major topic of discussion will be whether chat rooms and instant messaging are positive or negative experiences for autistic users, whether they actually improve social skills or they just increase isolation. The Internet will be the main field of inquiry and the main tool of this research.

Literature review

Autism is a disorder of perplexing nature that enivitably has impairments that last into adulthood for the afflicted and lifelong implications for their families. (`Asgeirsd`ottir et al, 2006, p.1361) Autism is not only difficult to understand clinically and behaviorally in relation to the person with the disability but also diagnostically, in terms of inconsistency of classification. This paper intends to investigate the history of autism, explain the currently accepted clinical definition and description of the disorder and the recognized related condition along the autism spectrum disorder or ASD, Asperger's disorder, and finally to attempt to ...