A Randomized Trial: Group Cognitive Behavior Therapy for Children With High-Functioning Autism Spectrum Disorders and Anxiety

Children with ASD and anxiety in our initial studies have displayed reductions in anxiety symptoms following the delivery of the FYF intervention. Given these initial successes, there are two primary purposes of this study. First, to train outpatient clinicians to fidelity on the FYF intervention for 8-14 year old children with high-functioning ASD and clinical anxiety. Second, to develop an optimal training model for learning the FYF intervention. The primary aims of Phase 1 are to develop a training manual and deliver a workshop on the FYF model to a group of outpatient clinicians in preparation for the clinicians to deliver the FYF intervention to four groups of children with ASD and anxiety. In Phase 2, the primary aims include comparing three instruction methods of learning to clinicians at three different outpatient clinics, by assessing increases in clinicians' acquisition of the intervention techniques and estimating the degree of reduction in anxiety symptoms on the primary outcome measures for the children with ASD. Instruction methods are: a) Manual, b) Workshop, c) Workshop-Plus. We hypothesize that clinicians receiving the Workshop-Plus (workshop plus ongoing consultation) condition will achieve treatment fidelity at a faster rate than clinicians receiving the other two instruction methods, and the children with ASD in the Workshop-Plus condition will display greater reductions in anxiety symptoms compared to the children in the other two conditions.