Children's social preference for teachers versus peers in autism inclusion classrooms: An objective perspective.

ABSTRACT: In inclusive preschools, children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and other developmental disabilities (DD) are less socially engaged with peers than are typically developing (TD) children. However, there is limited objective information describing how children with ASD engage with teachers, or how teacher engagement compares to engagement with peers. We tracked over 750 hours' worth of children's (N = 77; N_ASD = 24, N_DD = 23, N_TD = 30; M_age = 43.98 months) and teachers' (N = 12) locations and orientations across eight inclusion preschool classrooms to quantify child-teacher and child-peer social preference. Social approach velocity and time in social contact were computed for each child and compared across social partners to index children's

SUBMITTER: Drye M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11782723 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature