Autistic DisorderNCT03536351
Building Social Skills With Interdisciplinary Process Drama in ASD
A study testing Interdisciplinary process drama in people with Autistic Disorder, run by University of Utah at 1 site in United States.
Trial summary
This is a one group pre-post feasibility study of an interdisciplinary (theatre, Occupational Therapy (OT) and Speech Language Pathology (SLP)) intervention targeted at social skill development in children, aged 3-4. Read more about this study
- Who is it for?
- Ages 3 to 4 yearsHealthy volunteers can take part
- Conditions the study is for
- Autistic Disorder
- What is being tested?
- Interdisciplinary process drama
- Type of treatment
- Lifestyle or therapy programme
- Could I receive a placebo?
- No, everyone receives an active treatment
- How many people
- 15 participants
- Where
- 1 siteUnited States
- Study dates
- 1 Jul 2018to 15 Jan 2019
- Phase
- Interventional
- Are there results?
- None posted in the registry
Key requirements
Who can take part, as listed by the sponsor. Only the study team can confirm whether you are eligible, so take this list to your doctor.
- Ages 3 to 4 years
- All sexes
- Healthy volunteers accepted
- Child
Who may be able to join
- aged 3-4 years old
- documented diagnosis of ASD from a licensed professional using DSM 5 criteria12; If no documentation available, meets cut off on Autism Diagnostic Observation Scale (ADOS -2)13 that will be administered by trained study staff.
- passes language and cognitive screen (see attached screening document with decision rules) and a receptive language age equivalence of ≥30 months and a non-verbal age equivalent score of ≥30 months on the Mullen Scale of Early Learning
- have a caregiver willing/able to bring them to the University for the study sessions and to schedule up to 3 assessment visits prior to intervention start and 3 assessment sessions after intervention end
- family's primary language is English
- aged 3-4
- normal or corrected to normal vision and hearing
- English speaking
Who cannot join
- have no other major medical conditions (i.e., no genetic disorders such as Fragile X, Down syndrome)
- seizure disorder
- uncorrected hearing or visual impairment
- other condition causing motor impairment, such as Cerebral Palsy
- history of developmental delay or neurological disorder
Trial locations and contacts
1 site in 1 country.
About this study
Official title: Building Social Skills With Interdisciplinary Drama With Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder
This is a one group pre-post feasibility study of an interdisciplinary (theatre, Occupational Therapy (OT) and Speech Language Pathology (SLP)) intervention targeted at social skill development in children, aged 3-4. The intervention uses process drama modified with OT and SLP techniques and using typically developing peer models . Feasibility outcomes are recruitment rates, retention rates, daily program records of ease of implementing the program, and record of modifications needed. Child primary outcomes are Social Skills Improvement Scale (SSIS) and the Theory of Mind (ToM) Battery and Inventory within 4 weeks of program end. Secondary outcomes will be the Structured Play Assessment (SPA) within 4 weeks post-intervention, observations of social interactions (e.g.,eye contract, joint attention, verbal utterances, physical contact) during intervention sessions, brain activity in frontal and temporal/parietal areas during ToM tasks measured by high density EEG within 4 weeks of program end, and parental interview at 3 months related to child's social skills.
Read the detailed description
Five children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and 3-5 typically developing (TD) children will complete baseline testing. The TD children will only complete the EEG testing, while the ASD children and their parents will complete all outcome assessments. In addition to the outcome measures listed in the Brief Summary, we will administer the Vineland Adaptive Behavioral Scales (Vineland - II), the Mullen Scales of Early Learning, and the Autism Diagnostic Observation Scale - II (if they have not had one administered within the past 12 months) for sample description.
During the EEG session, brain activity during theory of mind and other social stimuli will be used to measure brain behavior relationships. The recordings will adhere to standard clinical EEG procedures, using high density EEG providing a high spatial resolution for electrical source imaging in brain space. They will be conducted by a Registered EEG Technologist (R. EEG T) with a specially trained student assistant. The procedure will involve first explaining to the parent and child what will be done. The participants will sit within a chair or a parent's lap while the EEG is recorded. The EEG tasks will consist of the following: First the child will be asked to open and close their eyes for a few minutes to record a baseline resting EEG. Then there will be both auditory sounds (intonations and word components) and images of social stimuli embedded between fun cartoon stimuli to maintain the child's attention displayed on a screen. The pictures will consist of eye movements, facial gestures, and point light diagrams of body movements.
The process drama program will be conducted with 5 children with ASD and 3-5 TD peer models 3 days per week for 12 week for 1-1.5 hours each day. The program will consist of several sections. Each day will open with an opening ritual that is movement based involving mirroring activity. This is followed by a welcome/greeting activity, involving things like a song and Name activity. The remainder of the activities build around a story for the day. The story will be one that holds interest for young children, such as a day in the life of a tree who gets visited by animals and people. The story unfolds with problems to solve and social interactions to do. Participants and the drama teachers take on different roles to bring out the story. Engagement starts out with drama pieces that the children can do individually and progress to those requiring a partner and then small groups. The sessions close with a closing ritual, reminding the participants of what was done during the session and a song. All the activities focus on building understanding the emotions and intentions of others and appropriate social interactions. The setting of the program and the specific activities have been planned with a collaborative team of drama teachers, an occupational therapists, and a speech language pathologists.
The process drama sessions will be taped and later scored for social interactions and social verbal and non-verbal communication. We will also examine the engagement of the participants with ASD to determine if we need to change/alter any procedures/techniques that we are using during the process drama sessions in subsequent versions of this research. We will also examine the behavior of the peer models to identify areas in which the research team may need to change to better engage the peer models in subsequent sessions.
After the end of the process drama intervention, the participants with ASD will repeat the baseline assessments within 4 weeks of intervention end. The assessments that will be repeated are the ToMT, SPA and SSiS. The children with ASD will also complete another EEG session as they did at baseline. Parents will be interviewed at 3 months post-intervention regarding changes in social skills.
- Conditions
- Autistic Disorder
- Being tested
- Interdisciplinary process drama
- Keywords
- social skills, child, theory of mind, drama, occupational therapy, speech-language pathology, neural activation
- Medical subject headings
- Autistic Disorder, Social Skills
What participants receive
What participants receive. In a randomised study each person is assigned to one group by chance.
Interdisciplinary process dramaBehavioural
Process drama program (3 days/week, 12 weeks, 1-1.5 hours per session) of movement-based activities combining music and drama. Activities that target understanding of emotions, intentions, and appropriate social interactions have been planned by a team of drama teachers, occupational therapists, and speech-language pathologists.
| Study group | Role | What they receive |
|---|---|---|
| Interdisciplinary process drama | Experimental | Process drama program (3 days/week, 12 weeks, 1-1.5 hours per session) of movement-based activities combining music and drama. Activities have been planned by a collaborative team of drama teachers, occupational therapists, and speech language pathologists, and target understanding emotion, intentions and appropriate social interactions. Receives: Behavioral: Interdisciplinary process drama |
What is being measured
The primary outcome is the main question the study is designed to answer.
Social Skills Improvement Scale
Parent rating of statements about child's social interactions as never, seldom, often, almost always. These are transformed to numeric scores, varying with the content of the item, either ranging from 0-3 or 1-3. Each subscale has a different number of items. Subscales of communication, cooperation, assertion, responsibility, empathy, engagement, self-control scores, externalizing problem behaviors, bullying, hyperactivity/inattention, and internalizing problem behaviors items are summed to obtain subscale raw scores, which are translated into "below average", "average", and "above average", based on age and gender normative data. The autism spectrum subscale is scored the same way.
Measured: 4 weeks post intervention
Theory of Mind Battery & Inventory
Performance test of ToM activities and parent ratings of statements of child behavior in ToM situations
Measured: 4 weeks post intervention
recruitment
ability to recruit needed number of participants in time frame availability
Measured: pre intervention
retention
number of participants who completed 4 week assessment and parental interview
Measured: 4 weeks post- and 3 months post-intervention
Secondary outcomes (5)
Structured Play Assessment
performance test of how child plays with toys
Measured: 4 weeks post intervention
Brain activity during ToM tasks
Dense EEG recordings of brain activity in front/temporal/parietal areas during ToM tasks
Measured: 4 weeks post intervention
Parental perceptions of social skills
interview with parent regarding changes seen in social skills
Measured: 3 months post intervention
Changes in social skills during program
observations (via digital recordings) of social skills during intervention program
Measured: 12 weeks during program
modifications needed to program
record of modifications to the program during the intervention
Measured: 12 weeks during program
Timeline
From the start of the study to its completion; the mark is today. Estimated dates are the sponsor’s plan.
- First posted24 May 2018
- Study start1 Jul 2018
- Primary completion15 Jan 2019
- Study completion15 Jan 2019
Resources
- Official record on ClinicalTrials.govThe registry entry this page is built from, with its full change history.
- Publications (3)Papers the sponsor has linked to this study.
- Other trials for Autistic DisorderStudies of the same condition, open and under way.
- More trials run by University of UtahThe sponsor's other registered studies.
- What the trial phases meanHow a treatment moves from first tests in people to approval.
More details
For doctors and researchers: how the study is designed, who runs it, and its registry IDs.
Study design
- Study type
- Interventional
- Phase
- Phase N/A
- Primary purpose
- Treatment
- Allocation
- Not applicable
- Intervention model
- Single group
- Model description
- One group design
- Masking
- None (open label)
- Enrolment
- 15 participants (actual)
Sponsor and investigators
- Lead sponsor
- University of Utah
- Sponsor type
- University, hospital or other
- Responsible party
- Principal investigator, Lorie Richards, University of Utah
- Investigators
- Lorie G Richards, PhD, Principal investigator, University of Utah
IDs, dates and publications
- ClinicalTrials.gov ID
- NCT03536351
- Sponsor's protocol ID
- IRB_0091961
- Status last verified
- Aug 2020
- First submitted
- 14 May 2018
- Last updated
- 19 Aug 2020
- Results posted
- No
- Data monitoring committee
- No
- FDA-regulated drug
- No
- FDA-regulated device
- No
- Individual data sharing
- No
Publications
Corbett BA, Key AP, Qualls L, Fecteau S, Newsom C, Coke C, Yoder P. Improvement in Social Competence Using a Randomized Trial of a Theatre Intervention for Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder. J Autism Dev Disord. 2016 Feb;46(2):658-72. doi: 10.1007/s10803-015-2600-9.
PubMed 26419766Pelphrey KA, Morris JP, McCarthy G. Grasping the intentions of others: the perceived intentionality of an action influences activity in the superior temporal sulcus during social perception. J Cogn Neurosci. 2004 Dec;16(10):1706-16. doi: 10.1162/0898929042947900.
PubMed 15701223Thomas MS, Davis R, Karmiloff-Smith A, Knowland VC, Charman T. The over-pruning hypothesis of autism. Dev Sci. 2016 Mar;19(2):284-305. doi: 10.1111/desc.12303. Epub 2015 Apr 6.
PubMed 25845529
Study at a glance
From the registry record, last updated by the sponsor on 19 Aug 2020. Recruitment status is as the sponsor reported it: confirm with the study team.
- Official title
- Building Social Skills With Interdisciplinary Drama With Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder
- ClinicalTrials.gov ID
- NCT03536351
- Acronym / sponsor ID
- IRB_0091961
- Conditions
- Autistic Disorder
- Keywords
- social skills, child, theory of mind, drama, occupational therapy, speech-language pathology, neural activation
- Study type
- Interventional
- Recruitment status
- Completed
- Enrolment
- 15 participants (actual)
- Lead sponsor
- University of UtahUniversity, hospital or other
- Study start
- 1 Jul 2018 (actual)
- Primary completion
- 15 Jan 2019 (actual)
- Study completion
- 15 Jan 2019 (actual)
- First posted
- 24 May 2018 (actual)
- Results
- Not posted in the source record
Clinical summary
The research question as the sponsor registered it. This describes what the study plans to test, not what it found.
This is a one group pre-post feasibility study of an interdisciplinary (theatre, Occupational Therapy (OT) and Speech Language Pathology (SLP)) intervention targeted at social skill development in children, aged 3-4. The intervention uses process drama modified with OT and SLP techniques and using typically developing peer models . Feasibility outcomes are recruitment rates, retention rates, daily program records of ease of implementing the program, and record of modifications needed. Child primary outcomes are Social Skills Improvement Scale (SSIS) and the Theory of Mind (ToM) Battery and Inventory within 4 weeks of program end. Secondary outcomes will be the Structured Play Assessment (SPA) within 4 weeks post-intervention, observations of social interactions (e.g.,eye contract, joint attention, verbal utterances, physical contact) during intervention sessions, brain activity in frontal and temporal/parietal areas during ToM tasks measured by high density EEG within 4 weeks of program end, and parental interview at 3 months related to child's social skills.
Detailed description
Five children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and 3-5 typically developing (TD) children will complete baseline testing. The TD children will only complete the EEG testing, while the ASD children and their parents will complete all outcome assessments. In addition to the outcome measures listed in the Brief Summary, we will administer the Vineland Adaptive Behavioral Scales (Vineland - II), the Mullen Scales of Early Learning, and the Autism Diagnostic Observation Scale - II (if they have not had one administered within the past 12 months) for sample description.
During the EEG session, brain activity during theory of mind and other social stimuli will be used to measure brain behavior relationships. The recordings will adhere to standard clinical EEG procedures, using high density EEG providing a high spatial resolution for electrical source imaging in brain space. They will be conducted by a Registered EEG Technologist (R. EEG T) with a specially trained student assistant. The procedure will involve first explaining to the parent and child what will be done. The participants will sit within a chair or a parent's lap while the EEG is recorded. The EEG tasks will consist of the following: First the child will be asked to open and close their eyes for a few minutes to record a baseline resting EEG. Then there will be both auditory sounds (intonations and word components) and images of social stimuli embedded between fun cartoon stimuli to maintain the child's attention displayed on a screen. The pictures will consist of eye movements, facial gestures, and point light diagrams of body movements.
The process drama program will be conducted with 5 children with ASD and 3-5 TD peer models 3 days per week for 12 week for 1-1.5 hours each day. The program will consist of several sections. Each day will open with an opening ritual that is movement based involving mirroring activity. This is followed by a welcome/greeting activity, involving things like a song and Name activity. The remainder of the activities build around a story for the day. The story will be one that holds interest for young children, such as a day in the life of a tree who gets visited by animals and people. The story unfolds with problems to solve and social interactions to do. Participants and the drama teachers take on different roles to bring out the story. Engagement starts out with drama pieces that the children can do individually and progress to those requiring a partner and then small groups. The sessions close with a closing ritual, reminding the participants of what was done during the session and a song. All the activities focus on building understanding the emotions and intentions of others and appropriate social interactions. The setting of the program and the specific activities have been planned with a collaborative team of drama teachers, an occupational therapists, and a speech language pathologists.
The process drama sessions will be taped and later scored for social interactions and social verbal and non-verbal communication. We will also examine the engagement of the participants with ASD to determine if we need to change/alter any procedures/techniques that we are using during the process drama sessions in subsequent versions of this research. We will also examine the behavior of the peer models to identify areas in which the research team may need to change to better engage the peer models in subsequent sessions.
After the end of the process drama intervention, the participants with ASD will repeat the baseline assessments within 4 weeks of intervention end. The assessments that will be repeated are the ToMT, SPA and SSiS. The children with ASD will also complete another EEG session as they did at baseline. Parents will be interviewed at 3 months post-intervention regarding changes in social skills.
Study design
- Primary purpose
- Treatment
- Allocation
- Not applicable
- Intervention model
- Single group
- Masking
- None (open label)
- Number of arms
- 1
- Model description
- One group design
| Arm | Type | Receives |
|---|---|---|
| Interdisciplinary process drama | Experimental | Behavioral: Interdisciplinary process dramaProcess drama program (3 days/week, 12 weeks, 1-1.5 hours per session) of movement-based activities combining music and drama. Activities have been planned by a collaborative team of drama teachers, occupational therapists, and speech language pathologists, and target understanding emotion, intentions and appropriate social interactions. |
Who may qualify
- Ages
- 3 to 4 years
- Sex
- All
- Healthy volunteers
- Accepted
- Age groups
- Child
Key inclusion criteria (8 listed)
- aged 3-4 years old
- documented diagnosis of ASD from a licensed professional using DSM 5 criteria12; If no documentation available, meets cut off on Autism Diagnostic Observation Scale (ADOS -2)13 that will be administered by trained study staff.
- passes language and cognitive screen (see attached screening document with decision rules) and a receptive language age equivalence of ≥30 months and a non-verbal age equivalent score of ≥30 months on the Mullen Scale of Early Learning
- have a caregiver willing/able to bring them to the University for the study sessions and to schedule up to 3 assessment visits prior to intervention start and 3 assessment sessions after intervention end
- family's primary language is English
Key exclusion criteria (5 listed)
- have no other major medical conditions (i.e., no genetic disorders such as Fragile X, Down syndrome)
- seizure disorder
- uncorrected hearing or visual impairment
- other condition causing motor impairment, such as Cerebral Palsy
- history of developmental delay or neurological disorder
Eligibility is decided by the study team after screening; this overview does not establish that a patient qualifies. Full inclusion and exclusion criteria.
Interventions
| Intervention | Type | Arms |
|---|---|---|
| Interdisciplinary process dramaProcess drama program (3 days/week, 12 weeks, 1-1.5 hours per session) of movement-based activities combining music and drama. Activities that target understanding of emotions, intentions, and appropriate social interactions have been planned by a team of drama teachers, occupational therapists, and speech-language pathologists. | Behavioural | Interdisciplinary process drama |
Primary outcome
Social Skills Improvement Scale
Time frame: 4 weeks post intervention
Parent rating of statements about child's social interactions as never, seldom, often, almost always. These are transformed to numeric scores, varying with the content of the item, either ranging from 0-3 or 1-3. Each subscale has a different number of items. Subscales of communication, cooperation, assertion, responsibility, empathy, engagement, self-control scores, externalizing problem behaviors, bullying, hyperactivity/inattention, and internalizing problem behaviors items are summed to obtain subscale raw scores, which are translated into "below average", "average", and "above average", based on age and gender normative data. The autism spectrum subscale is scored the same way.
Theory of Mind Battery & Inventory
Time frame: 4 weeks post intervention
Performance test of ToM activities and parent ratings of statements of child behavior in ToM situations
recruitment
Time frame: pre intervention
ability to recruit needed number of participants in time frame availability
retention
Time frame: 4 weeks post- and 3 months post-intervention
number of participants who completed 4 week assessment and parental interview
5 secondary outcomes
Structured Play Assessment
Time frame: 4 weeks post intervention
Brain activity during ToM tasks
Time frame: 4 weeks post intervention
Parental perceptions of social skills
Time frame: 3 months post intervention
Changes in social skills during program
Time frame: 12 weeks during program
modifications needed to program
Time frame: 12 weeks during program
Results and safety
The study is completed, but results are not available in the source record. That does not mean the treatment did or did not work.
Research links
- Official record on ClinicalTrials.govLast updated by the sponsor 19 Aug 2020.
- Results publication: PubMed 26419766Corbett BA, Key AP, Qualls L, Fecteau S, Newsom C, Coke C, Yoder P. Improvement in Social Competence Using a Randomized Trial of a Theatre Intervention for Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder. J Autism Dev Disord. 2016 Feb;46(2):658-72. doi: 10.1007/s10803-015-2600-9.
- Results publication: PubMed 15701223Pelphrey KA, Morris JP, McCarthy G. Grasping the intentions of others: the perceived intentionality of an action influences activity in the superior temporal sulcus during social perception. J Cogn Neurosci. 2004 Dec;16(10):1706-16. doi: 10.1162/0898929042947900.
- Results publication: PubMed 25845529Thomas MS, Davis R, Karmiloff-Smith A, Knowland VC, Charman T. The over-pruning hypothesis of autism. Dev Sci. 2016 Mar;19(2):284-305. doi: 10.1111/desc.12303. Epub 2015 Apr 6.
- Individual participant dataSharing planned: No
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Referral and contact
AzTrials does not enrol participants or take referrals. Contact the study team or a site listed below; they decide who can take part. This study is not recruiting at the moment.
Lorie G Richards, PhD principal investigator
University of Utah
1 site in 1 country: see every site and its status.
Questions about this trial
What is this clinical trial studying?
A study testing Interdisciplinary process drama in people with Autistic Disorder, run by University of Utah at 1 site in United States.
The full registered description is in the About this study section and the official record.
Who may be eligible to take part?
The sponsor lists 8 inclusion and 5 exclusion criteria. Eligibility is decided by the study team after screening, so read the full criteria and contact a listed site.
Is this clinical trial currently recruiting?
The record says: finished, as of the sponsor's last update on 19 Aug 2020. Status can change between updates, so confirm with the study contact before making plans.
Where is the study taking place?
The record lists 1 site in United States. Whether a site is taking part right now should be confirmed with that site. See every site.
What are the possible benefits and risks?
They depend on the study and the treatment, and no study can promise a benefit. The study team explains the known risks during informed consent, before anyone joins; the record itself does not list them.
Are results available for this study?
The study is completed, but results are not available in the source record. That does not mean the treatment did or did not work.
How can a doctor refer a patient or contact the research team?
The record lists no contact. The official record names the sponsor, who can be asked directly. AzTrials does not enrol participants or take referrals.
What does the primary outcome measure?
Social Skills Improvement Scale (time frame: 4 weeks post intervention). The study lists 4 primary outcomes in all. It is what the study was designed to measure, not a finding.
Where can I read the original study information?
On the ClinicalTrials.gov record for NCT03536351, which also lists 3 linked publications.
Does a listing mean the treatment is approved or proven to work?
No. A listing means the study is registered. It does not show that the treatment is safe, works, or is approved by a regulator.
How often is this information updated?
AzTrials copies changed records from ClinicalTrials.gov every night and reloads the whole registry every week. The sponsor last updated this record on 19 Aug 2020.