EDUCATION AND TRAINING DEPARTMENT

OCCUPATIONAL THERAPY
JOURNAL REPORT SUMMARY

TITLE: Peer Actors and Theater Techniques Play Pivotal Roles in Improving Social Play and
Anxiety for Children With Autism
AUTHOR: Sara Ioanno, Alexandra P. Key, Rachael A. Muscatello, Mark Klemencic, Blythe A.
Corbett
YEAR: 2020
I. SUMMARY OF JOURNAL
One of the main areas of occupation that is greatly affected by the diagnosis of Autism
Spectrum Disorder is social participation and play. Naturally, children with Autism Spectrum
Disorder find it hard and challenging to really show social interaction skills, specifically initiating
conversations, responding to questions, and maintaining conversations. Moreover, these social
interaction skills also affect their participation in age-appropriate play that would need social
interaction with peers. SENSE Theatre, a peer-mediated, theatre-based program is a study made
to look at how this intervention strategy would improve social competence and group play
participation for children with ASD. Furthermore, this study also dwelled on the presence of
social anxiety felt by children with ASD in engaging with peers who are typically developing but
are within their age range. As they also focused on looking at the presence of social anxiety, they
also aimed to lessen social anxiety and facilitate social and play participation for children with
ASD, at the same time, lessening the stigma and building a healthy relationship with these
children for those who are typically developing children.

II. RELEVANCE TO THE OCCUPATIONAL THERAPY PRACTICE

As occupational therapists, our goal for our clients with ASD is for them to participate in
activities that they want to, need to, and are expected to do in their age or in simple words: help
them participate in their daily occupations. Autism Spectrum Disorder is a lifelong condition that
would persist until adulthood. Depending on severity and the support or interventions given,
individuals with ASD may go on to live a normal life with ongoing support to address the
symptoms. What do occupational therapists do to help these individuals reach their goals? That
is through addressing the underlying factors that affect their performance such as sensory
processing, behavioral issues, motor skills, processing skills, social interaction skills, and other
factors that might be affecting performance such as context and environment as well.
In this journal, it gave an overview of how improving skills needed for social and play
participation is addressed alongside with the context and social environment of the individuals –
the peers and how they will interact with these children. As occupational therapy practitioners,
we can agree that social context and environment are important factors to consider as they have
a huge impact on occupational performance. In order for them to have better occupational
performance, it is also important to make them feel that they are in an environment that would
not force them into making activities or performing them with others. BUT, it is important to
have active participation in these activities because they learn better by actively experiencing
social interaction with other people, specifically kids their age.
The Occupational Therapy profession provides the child with active participation, so that
they get first hand experience of what needs to be done for an effective social participation. In
 that way, they learn social competence and thinking about what others also think about and
have a shared understanding of the topic. Moreover, their self-confidence also improves as they
are given the chance to interact with other people who are new to them.
In this study, it also showed the importance of flooding or the constant and immediate
exposure for the kids in an anxiety-stimulating environment, which is exposing them
immediately to a lot of children their age, so they can tolerate it. Furthermore, modelling is very
much used here during peer-mediated activities. While they can learn from socially observing us
or other authoritative figures, it is more important that they see it being done by other children
with the same age range as they are.

III. RELEVANCE TO THE PHILIPPINE SETTING

According to Autism Society Philippines, at least 1 in 100 Filipinos are on the spectrum of
ASD, which roughly translates to 1.2 million Filipinos living with the diagnosis. With this statistics
and information, it gives us a clear and wide picture of how a lot of people may have problems in
social and play participation given the classical picture of their diagnosis. Moreover, a lot of
children in the spectrum have differences in functioning – some are functional enough to go into
mainstream schools and be able to interact with peers their age. With this, this study can be
relevant in our setting as both part of an intervention plan and as part of our role as advocates
for people in the spectrum.
For our role as clinicians, this study and strategy can be of inspiration for us to try
peer-mediated interventions and sessions that can really establish and improve social skills
through learning through other people. It may not necessarily be like the theater role play, but
we can start with simple pair-ups activity for improvement of play and social skills. For our role
as advocates, this article can be a strategy for us to break the stigma between typically
developing individuals and individuals in the spectrum. As a lot of people call it – weirdo,
maingay, hindi mapakali, hindi makausap, etc., we can teach them how to be more open and
understanding to the everyday struggles they are facing through letting them interact with
people with ASD.

Prepared by:
Noted by:

___________________________ ____________________________
Claire Lucille H. Caresosa OT Clinical Supervisor
OT intern