A Randomized Clinical Trial Targeting Daily Living Skills in Autistic Adolescents Without an Intellectual Disability Before the Transition to Adulthood.

This was a pilot. Sixty-four teens completed it, and the authors say a larger sample is needed to work out which teens respond. Every outcome came from the caregiver, who knew which programme their teen was in and had invested effort in it, so the reported gains may be biased. The adolescents' own view was not collected. Delivery changed from in person to telehealth partway through because of COVID-19, and the authors say a fully powered trial of the telehealth version is still needed. Gains were measured within two weeks of finishing, so nothing here shows whether the skills were kept. The sample lacked diversity in income and race, and all participants had an IQ of 70 or above, so this says nothing about autistic teens with lower IQ or higher support needs.

The only declaration in the text supplied says the authors have no conflicts of interest to disclose. No funding source is named.

Do not read this as proof the programme works. It was a pilot of 64 teens, every outcome was reported by a caregiver who knew which programme their teen was in, and the skills were measured only right after treatment ended, so nobody knows whether the gains lasted.