Sustained attention training in children with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder
Objective. Attentional difficulties are the most commonly observed behaviours in children with FASD, and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is often cited as a central feature of the profile associated with FASD. Attention deficits can be noted as early as infancy, or during the prescho...
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| Format: | Thesis |
| Language: | English |
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Memorial University of Newfoundland
2008
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| Online Access: | https://research.library.mun.ca/9862/ https://research.library.mun.ca/9862/1/Vernescu_RoxanaM.pdf |
| Summary: | Objective. Attentional difficulties are the most commonly observed behaviours in children with FASD, and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is often cited as a central feature of the profile associated with FASD. Attention deficits can be noted as early as infancy, or during the preschool years, and become critical when children enter the school system. Deficits in learning and memory are often secondary to an inability to attend effectively, which is not surprising given that attention is necessary for orienting toward relevant concepts or events. Without appropriate intervention, even mild deficits in this domain can have a significant negative impact on a child's development, as children grow missing important information in their immediate environment, having difficulty recalling events, making mistakes in daily tasks, and having difficulty with higher level cognitive processing such as problem solving and reasoning. Intervention research for children with FASD is limited to two published reports, with a glaring dearth in the area of attention. The purpose of the current study was to implement a cognitive-based intervention strategy that targeted attentional processes directly. -- Participants and methods. Twenty Labrador Inuit children (ages 6.8-11.9) were divided into 2 groups matched for age and non-verbal reasoning and randomly assigned to attention process training that focused on sustained attention (SA), or contact control (CC) conditions that included academic support and games. Pre- and post-treatment assessments were conducted with direct standardized measures of verbal and non-verbal reasoning (KBIT2 and CTONI) and attention (KiTAP and TEA-Ch), and indirect measures of attention and executive functioning (ADDES-3-SV and BRIEF teacher checklists). There were no significant differences between the treatment and contact-control groups on pre-training measures of attention or verbal and non-verbal reasoning. Children were trained using materials from Thomson and colleagues' Pay Attention ... |
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