Peer-reviewed article
Outcomes from the ASPEN intervention program: a randomized clinical trial of a culturally adapted parent-mediated intervention program in low-resource settings.
Vanegas SB, Magaña S ·
Summary
Written by AI, not yet AICS's view · claude-haiku-4-5-20251001This study tested a parent-mediated intervention program designed for families with young autistic children from low-resource households. Forty-five families were randomly assigned to either 12 weekly coaching sessions or a lighter comparison program with check-ins. Parents who received the intensive program felt more confident using autism strategies, though both groups improved in actually using those strategies, and children in both groups showed gains in social communication.
Key points
- Parents in the intensive intervention group showed greater improvement in self-efficacy for using evidence-based strategies compared to the comparison group
- Both intervention and comparison groups improved in their actual use of evidence-based strategies with their children
- Children in the comparison group improved in social communication skills
- Parents in the comparison group improved in feeling empowered despite receiving less intensive support
- The study suggests less intensive parent interventions may be as effective as more regular programs for low-resource families
Limitations
The study does not specify which countries or regions the low-resource households were located in, making it unclear how geographically or culturally specific the findings are. The sample size is small (n=45), and the document does not provide details on long-term follow-up or sustained outcomes.
Abstract
This randomized controlled study examined the efficacy of a culturally adapted parent-mediated intervention for parents and young children with autism (n = 45) from low-resource households (ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT04505488). Families from these settings are often left out of autism intervention studies and arguably have unique needs not considered in autism intervention work. Parent/child dyads were randomized to the intervention group, which received 12 weekly sessions that included psychoeducation and coaching of evidence-based (EB) strategies with their children, or the comparison group who received all materials and 4 triweekly check-in sessions. We found that parents in the intervention group showed improvement in their self-efficacy (confidence) in using EB strategies, compared to the comparison group, and both groups improved in the use of EB strategies. Parents in the comparison group also improved in feeling more empowered and their children improved in social communication skills. These findings suggest that less intense parent interventions may be just as efficacious as those that require more regular participation for families from low-resource households. More research is needed to find the right balance and active ingredients to benefit these families. Clinical trial registration https://clinicaltrials.gov/study/NCT04505488, identifier NCT04505488.
Findings the Hub has extracted
Each claim below is labelled by its type of design and links back to this report.
- Intervention
- Culturally adapted parent-mediated intervention program consisting of 12 weekly sessions with psychoeducation and coaching of evidence-based strategies, compared to a lighter comparison condition with materials and 4 triweekly check-in sessions
- Population
- 45 parent-child dyads with young children with autism from low-resource households
Key finding
Parents in the intervention group showed significantly greater improvement in self-efficacy compared to comparison group
SB et al. · Europe PMC · 19 Jun 2026