A Comparison of Animated and Adult Video Modelling in Teaching Social-Communication Skills to 3-Year-Olds with Autism Spectrum Disorders

This study aims to compare the effectiveness of emerging animated video modelling (VM) and the most widely used adult VM in teaching social-communication skills to 3-year-olds with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) in China. A single-case experimental design was used, with data analysed by using visual analysis and an effect size measure, namely, the baseline corrected Tau (Tau-BC). Three 3-year-old preschoolers participated in this study. Each preschooler’s social-communication behaviours across the baseline, intervention, withdrawal, and maintenance conditions were recorded and analysed. Results showed that all three VM effectively improved preschoolers’ social-communication behaviours; preschoolers’ improvement in overall social communication and scripted social communication was greater in response to animated VM than adult VM; two of the three preschoolers’ improvement in unscripted social communication was greater in response to animated VM than adult VM. Mixed VM led to the greatest improvement in all three social-communication behaviours for two of the three preschoolers. The preliminary findings extended previous findings by demonstrating for the first time that animated VM was more effective than adult VM, and mixed VM was more effective than animated VM or adult VM alone for two of the three preschoolers.