Effectiveness of Strength-Based intervention for children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD)

Effectiveness of Strength-based Intervention
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Effectiveness of Strength-based Intervention
Neurodevelopmental disorders, particularly autism spectrum disorders, have multifaceted effects not only on children but also in families, leading to a decrease in the quality of life. These disorders affect the nervous system's development, leading to abnormal cognitive function, affecting learning ability, emotion control, self-control, time management, and memory. Autistic Spectrum disorder (ASD) is a global health threat that affects children’s social interactions and communication, needless to mention the enormous financial burden it causes to the country and caregivers (World Health Organization, 2020).
The prevalence of ASD has multiplied in the past decade across all racial, ethnic, and social-economic groups. According to the World Health Organisation (2020), one in every 160 children has ASD. In the United States, one in every 54 children has ASD (Center for Disease Control and Prevention, 2020). Research shows that prevalence will keep rising due to greater awareness, environmental influences, metabolic imbalances, genetic mutations, improved reporting, better diagnostic tools, and expansion of diagnostic criteria (Shochet et al., 2020). With this in mind, it is essential to develop and implement approaches such as strength-based intervention to improve the quality of life of children suffering from these disorders.
Common approaches for autistic children emphasize cognitive, social, and behavioral insufficiencies but fails to examine strengths. Frequently, the community’s predisposition towards children focuses on autism instead of the whole kid (Duan et al, 2019). Autistic children are often considered as lacking in many areas rather than being celebrated for the many strengths they possess. Although strengths-based interventions have been largely used to improve children's lives with milder behavioral disorders, strength-based interventions are still not widely implemented in the community.
Current studies and new directions have pointed out the flaws of this deficit-based thinking and instead advocates for more strengths-based approaches supporting autistic children. Unlike these deficit-based interventions, strength-based approaches focus on the children's strengths and capabilities, rather than autism itself (Hammond, 2010). As such, educators and caregivers provide more information about the strengths a child possesses and strategies to support their learning and psychosocial development. The approach presumes competence, recognizing that all children can learn, communicate, participate in social activities in their own way, and respect the value of human diversity (Hammond, 2010; Galloway et al, 2020).
The strength-based intervention has been widely used in different fields ranging from organizations, individuals, associations through communities. Over the years, numerous implementation approaches have been developed to support the foundational blocks of strength perspective (Galloway et al., 2020). In common, these models focus on the collaborative process between individuals empowered and those empowering them to exploit their strengths and talents to improve th...