Identifying and measuring the common elements of naturalistic developmental behavioral interventions for autism spectrum disorder: Development of the NDBI-Fi.
Kyle M Frost, Jessica Brian, Grace W Gengoux and 4 others
PMID 32731748WHAT IT FOUND
A new 8-item video rating tool reliably measures how well caregivers use common autism intervention strategies.
It distinguishes trained from untrained parents and detects improvement after training. The tool measures implementation quality, not child outcomes, so high scores do not prove the child improved.
Key findings
01The tool identifies 11 essential strategies shared across different autism interventions, such as following the child's lead and modeling language.
02Caregivers who received training scored significantly higher on the measure than those who did not, confirming the tool can distinguish between groups.
03The tool is sensitive to change, as caregivers' scores increased significantly from before to after they received intervention training.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
The study only tested the tool on caregiver-implemented interventions for young children, so it may not work for therapist-led or classroom-based programs. The measure was not tested against child outcomes, so it confirms parents are using the strategies, but not that the children are improving. Some individual items had lower reliability, meaning raters sometimes disagreed on how well a specific strategy was used. The experts surveyed were hand-picked by intervention developers, so the definition of 'essential' strategies may not reflect how these interventions are used in typical community settings.
Declared interests
One author receives royalties from a manual used in the research, but these royalties are donated back to the study.
The easy way to misread this
Do not interpret high scores on this tool as evidence that the child has improved. The measure assesses whether the caregiver is using the intervention strategies correctly, not the effectiveness of the intervention on the child's development.