A 25 Year Look Across the Spectrum with Kelly Bermingham & Jen Lucero Kelly Bermingham

Studies show that individuals with ASD have greater medical fears as compared to their peers. Kelly & Jen share their experience, strategies and research related to blood draws from their perspectives with their children who are now fully comfortable and independent in getting their blood drawn after years of stress!

Information:

⁠A pilot study to improve venipuncture compliance in children and adolescents with Autism Spectrum Disorders - PMC (nih.gov)⁠⁠Blood Work Parents.pdf (autismspeaks.org)⁠

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Kelly and Jen do I deep dive into the video, Assume That I Can, released on World Down's Syndrome Day, and talk about how our ethics code, 2.09, Involving Clients and Stakeholders and this video intersect into preference assessments for the purpose of assent and goal development.

Kelly and Jen are joined by Meghan Herron, Director of Research and Development from Easterseals, Southern California to discuss her research looking at measuring Quality of Life as an outcome for ABA services and discuss how this can be considered by any ABA practitioner, working alongside families.


Questionnaires - kidscreen.org



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There is research that suggests that individuals on the autism spectrum experience a much lower quality of life than nonautistic individuals across the lifespan. Quality of Life can be measured by happiness, which is considered a private event by behavior analysts. Indices of happiness are those observable behaviors that likely signal happiness, including smiling, laughing, and the absence of challenging behaviors. Both leisure skills and recreational skills are all ways to be happy yet are not often taught or included in programming or households living with autism.



Kely & Jen dive into the research and talk about the ways that Kelly has programmed for leisure and recreational skills and Jen has taught her own severely impacted son to have a very happy life.

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DEFINING, VALIDATING, AND INCREASING INDICES OF HAPPINESS AMONG PEOPLE WITH PROFOUND MULTIPLE DISABILITIES - Green - 1996 - Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis - Wiley Online Library

Defining and Measuring Indices of Happiness and Unhappiness in Children Diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder | Behavior Analysis in Practice (springer.com)

Kelly talks about her new book, including programming social skills intentionally to include group learning for children, and the difference between curriculum-based and activity and individualized learning.



Buy her book here:
The Group Experience – Different Roads (difflearn.com)

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Kelly and Jen talk with long-time RBT's Stephanie and Salvador about how they have managed to stay in the field for so long, and the real ways BCBA's and families can help support and prevent burnout. It's pretty real concrete and not rocket science.