Does culture matter in ABA-based autism interventions? Parent and professional experiences in the UK and China

ABSTRACT

The present study compared cultural differences in the UK and China in relation to Applied Behaviour Analysis (ABA)-based interventions for children with autism. In the UK, seven participants were interviewed (five professionals and two parents of children with autism). In China, eight participants took part in interviews (five professionals and three parents). Marked cultural and policy differences were found in the delivery of ABA-based early interventions for children with autism in the UK and China, e.g., home vs. school programmes.

KEYWORDS:

• Autism
• behaviour intervention
• comparative study
• UK and China
• Culture
• ABA
• EIBI

Acknowledgement

Data reported here stem from research conducted in part-fulfilment of the Master by Research (MRes) in Social Work by the first author at University of York under the supervision of the third author (Liao, 2013).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. OE stands for professionals in the UK and PE stands for parents in the UK;OC stands for professionals in China and PC stands for parents in China. See Table 1.

2. The Guidance of the Five-year Development Programme is a series of social and economic guidance which was initiated by the Central government of P.R.C. every five years (Wikipedia, n.d.)

Additional information

Funding

The first author was funded by Queen’s University Belfast/China Scholarship Council PhD studentship under the supervision of the second author.