The Effects of Music Therapy on the Interactive Lives of Children Who Have Autism
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Author
Gombert, Debra Jelinek
Date
2010
Degree
Master of Arts in Music Therapy
Abstract
The purpose of this study was to observe the effects of a music therapy intervention
on the interactive lives of pre-school children with Autistic Spectrum Disorders (ASD). The
participants were a convenience sample of 11 children who had been previously diagnosed as
having an ASD, and live in a suburban area of the Midwest. The children ranged in age from
3 to 5.5 years of age. Parents and an observer rated the children’s interactions with others
using a pre-test post-test pre-experimental design. The hypothesis was that a four-week
music therapy intervention would result in a positive change in each child’s interactive life,
as measured by the Interactive Life component of the Adult-Child Relationship Map (IARM), a tool developed by MacDonald (2004). The term interactive life is defined as having
three components: social play, imitation, and reciprocal turn-taking. Since impairments in
social interaction are a hallmark symptom of ASD, interventions that focus on these elements
are essential for children who have ASD. A trained observer reported a statistically
significant average increase of 0.8 points on the I-ARM. When the measure was completed
by the parents, only 5 out of 11 children had an increase in scores on the I-ARM; thus these
increases were not statistically significant. Since the results from the trained observer’s report
did show a statistically significant increase on the measure, this study indicates that music
therapy may be a valuable intervention to increase a child’s social interaction.
Recommendations for further research include conducting the intervention over a longer
period of time, using two observers to view each child’s sessions, and using a mixed-methods
approach in future study with the I-ARM.