Meta-Analysis of Pivotal Response Training for Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Abstract

The main purpose of this study was to review pivotal response training and examine the efficacy of pivotal response training for children with autism spectrum disorder. The other purposes of study were to (a) examine the characteristics of participants and components of the intervention in which pivotal response training was used; (b) determine the level of efficacy of pivotal response training to teach various behaviors to children with autism spectrum disorder; (c) determine whether the effectiveness of pivotal response training differed in terms of characteristics of the intervention; and (d) determine whether percentage of nonoverlapping data, percentage of nonoverlapping corrected data, and percentage of data points exceeding median were correlated. In this study, 34 single case research articles conducted with individuals with autism spectrum disorder and published in a peer-reviewed journal in between 1979-2012 were examined. Articles primarily were descriptively analyzed and then examined by use of meta-analysis. According to results, in half of the studies, treatment integrity was assessed, generalization and maintenance data were collected; in only a quarter of the studies, social validity data were collected. Pivotal response training that focused on two of the three core features of autism spectrum disorder were found effective in influencing individual outcomes. Results also indicated that percentage of nonoverlapping data, percentage of nonoverlapping corrected data, and percentage of data points exceeding median were correlated.