Resumen de Design Considerations for an Intensive Autism Treatment Centre.
Neil Deochand, Alissa A. Conway, R. Wayne Fuqua
Individuals with autistic spectrum disorder ( ASD) who display severe and challenging behaviour sometimes require centre-based intensive applied behaviour analysis ( ABA) therapy to meet their health, safety and educational needs. Unfortunately, despite the need for centre-based treatment, there is a paucity of empirical research on building and programme design features that influence positive behavioural outcomes for individuals with ASD. We surveyed professionals who had experience providing services to the ASD population regarding the building design and policy features that could facilitate treatment. This article highlights the features that were highly endorsed as beneficial in the design of an intensive ASD treatment facility, with the intended purpose of discovering which features create an environment in which the individuals can more easily transition into an appropriate mainstream learning environment. It is hoped that the results of the survey will be helpful to those developing ASD treatment facilities and allow them to circumvent trial and error that could occur when building a centre from the ground up. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
