Effects of continued behavioral intervention into school age for children with developmental disorders.

We found better outcome in intelligence and adaptive behavior scores for those children who continued to receive behavioral intervention in school compared to those children who ended their intervention. We compare the two groups of children during intervention in preschool, then eight and at nine years of age. The group of children (n=10) who received behavioral intervention in school continued to gain in intelligence and adaptive behavior scores, whereas the group that stopped (n=8) lost points. The difference in scores increased from when they were 8 years to when they were 9 years of age. This finding supports the hypotheses that behavioral intervention can continue to benefit some children with autism and other developmental disorders well into school age. We have not been able to detect any clear indications for stopping behavioral intervention, although it appears that children with scores in the normal range have more stable scores.