Impact of Online Acceptance and Commitment Therapy on Parent Psychopathology and Maladaptive Behaviors in Children with Autism and Related Disorders

• In Event: Poster Session 04
  In Poster Session: PS 04 Topic - Family Context & Processes

Abstract

In the current pandemic which has caused immense distress to all families, families with children with special needs face most challenges, and are in need of immediate and continued support. As per the dynamics of co-parenting, emotional and physical well-being of the parent directly impacts the child’s ability to self-regulate. The proposed study will include delivery of the intervention, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) in an ‘online’ format, most viable to reach more parents around the United States, and internationally.
The overall objective of ACT is to establish psychological flexibility leading to an increase in the quality of one’s life. Psychological flexibility is a behavioral repertoire that is vulnerable to private events and characterized by “adaptive, flexible, and creative responding with respect to those private events” (Blackledge & Drake, 2013). Current behavioral research suggests that psychological flexibility, as it relates to parenting is affected by the level of problematic behavior emitted by their child (Gould, Tarbox, Coyne, 2017). The literature that focuses on the use of ACT on psychological distress is geared toward parents of children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) (Gould, Tarbox, & Coyne, 2017). Our proposed study is a follow-up and extension of Gould, Tarbox, & Coyne’s (2017) study which reported reductions in parental experiential avoidance and increases in self-empathy post treatment. We will be including: (1) a culturally diverse and increased sample size (N ≥ 50) of parents with children with Autism and related disorders; (2) pre-and-posttest measures for emotion regulation, mood psychopathology, parent stress, values directed behavior, severity of child’s ASD symptomatology and maladaptive behaviors; and, (3) a delayed posttest to assess for maintenance of treatment gains.
The six pre-recorded/asynchronous weekly ACT training sessions (up to 30 minutes each) will include the following topics from the ACT manual (Gould, Tarbox, & Coyne, 2017): values identification, mindfulness strategies, defusion, acceptance, and committed action. Parents will be given homework exercises to practice in between training sessions, and researchers will individually check-in with the participants on a weekly basis to promote and monitor treatment adherence.
The main hypotheses of the study are as follows: (1) ACT will improve overall emotional regulation, well-being, stress, and mood of parents of children with Autism and related disorders; (2) Children of parents receiving ACT training will manifest reduced maladaptive behaviors.
Data analyses will be conducted using SPSS Version 26.0 (IBM Corp., 2019). First, descriptive statistics (i.e. means, standard deviations, and frequencies for categorical variables) will be reviewed as well as Pearson correlations to assess the relationship between all variables. Then, repeated measures ANOVA will be conducted to test the hypotheses presented above.
Currently, the recruitment for the study is underway (IRB approval has been received) and the projected study timeline is as follows: (1) Study intervention start date: November 2, 2020; (2) Study intervention end date: December 14, 2020; (3) Delayed-Posttest completion date: January 11, 2021; (4) Data analyses completed by: February 10, 2021; (5) Poster presentation for SRCD conference (April 7 - 9, 2021) completed by: March 1, 2021).

Authors

• Sadaf Khawar, Montclair State University
  Presenting Author

• Chana Tilson, Chicago School of Professional Psychology
  Non-Presenting Author