Shared minds: Effects of a mother's imitation of her child on the mother–child interaction

Children with Autistic Spectrum Disorders (ASD) have impaired social interaction right from early development. Previous studies (Dawson & Adams, 1984; Tiegerman & Primavera, 1981, 1984) have suggested that imitating children with ASD is effective in facilitating their social behaviors. The present case report, through a 6-month intervention, investigated how a home-based intervention of helping a mother imitate her 21-month-old child with ASD impacted the child's development of social communication outside the experimental settings. Our results show that the mother's imitation of her child might be associated with the development of nonverbal joint attention skills. Positive changes in the mother's emotion towards her child and the mother-child interaction also were noted and represent other important effects of parental involvement in therapeutic interventions for children with ASD.