- Author
- Title
- On mindfulness and autism
- Supervisors
- Co-supervisors
- Award date
- 10 May 2019
- Number of pages
- 225
- ISBN
- 9789463752671
- Document type
- PhD thesis
- Faculty
- Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences (FMG)
- Institute
- Research Institute of Child Development and Education (RICDE)
- Abstract
-
The overall aim of this thesis was to evaluate the effects of a mindfulness training for children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and a parallel Mindful Parenting training. Findings of the RCT (n = 158 students) showed that a very brief mindfulness exercise may be insufficient for raising empathy. Results from the repeated measures study (n = 74 parents and 45 children with ASD) showed that children’s social responsiveness, emotional and behavioral functioning improved, but their mindful awareness did not change. Parents themselves showed decreased over-reactive parenting, stress, internalizing, externalizing, and attention problems, and increased competence and mindfulness in parenting, and self-compassion. The majority of improvements remained up to 1 year later. Neurocognitive tests showed that children with ASD (n = 49) did not differ from typically developing children (n = 51) in their attention speed, but they were somewhat less accurate in their orienting and executive attention. In addition, small effects of the mindfulness program were found on executive and orienting attention. From grounded-theory based interviews with children (n = 14) and parents (n = 31) eight change processes emerged: connecting with peers, pausing, being aware, here and now, letting be, determining strategy, being and responding calm, and attuning to others. In the single-case studies using a multiple baseline design, it was found that most of the adolescents with ASD (n = 5) and a comorbid internalizing disorder partially benefitted from the mindfulness program. Overall, the findings of this thesis suggest that although the evidence stands in an initial stage, cultivating mindfulness could support families to cope with ASD and its associated difficulties.
- Persistent Identifier
- https://hdl.handle.net/11245.1/5b5bc404-afc9-4672-a59c-ed561052657c
- Downloads
-
Thesis (complete)
Chapter 1: General introduction
Chapter 2: Does mindfulness meditation increase empathy? An experiment
Chapter 3: Mindfulness-based program for children with autism spectrum disorder and their parents: Direct and long-term improvements
Chapter 4: Attention in children with autism spectrum disorder and the effects of a mindfulness-based program
Chapter 5: Mindfulness-based program for autism spectrum disorder: A qualitative study of the experiences of children and parents
Chapter 6: A person-centered approach in investigating a mindfulness-based program for adolescents with autism spectrum disorder
Chapter 7: General discussion
References; Appendices; Summary; Samenvatting (Dutch summary); List of publications and authorship contributions; Dankwoord (Acknowledgements); About the author
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