Engagement between Parents and Toddlers with Autism: A Qualitative Multiple-Case Study

Abstract

This qualitative multiple-case study comprehensively examined the circumstances that supported and hindered social engagement in the three toddlers with autism when they interacted with their mothers. Directive actions of mothers for controlling and teaching purposes and requesting actions of toddlers resulted in instrumental engagement during which power struggles were sometimes observed. The findings indicated that social engagement was established when one interacting partner’s social initiation was accepted with a social response from the other partner. Those socially engaged moments were first built upon the toddlers’ individual interests but maintained only by continuous back-and-forth responses from both mothers and toddlers manifesting a transactional sequence during which the schema of their interaction continuously changed, adapted, and developed. This finding revealed that social, rather than instrumental, engagement may lead, possibly, to a sense of joy in these children while interacting with their mothers. One further approach related to this finding can be concentrating on the child’s social motivation (e.g., having fun), rather than non-social motivation (e.g., receiving a favorite snack or toy) while interacting. Such an approach can be a promising avenue for optimally encouraging social purposes of engagement in toddlers with autism.