In general, individuals with autism spectrum disorder have poor outcomes in adulthood on almost any measure assessed. Poor outcomes, in part, may be related to inadequate planning leading up to adulthood, including inappropriate goal setting, ineffective communication, and inadequate involvement of all decision‐makers needed to inform planning. The skills in the repertoires of individuals on the spectrum have been shown in the research to directly impact the trajectory of outcomes. Yet, at present there is next to no peer‐reviewed literature that identifies evidence‐based procedures to teach practitioners how to write meaningful goals that will positively impact these outcomes. The present study therefore examined the effects of a treatment package aimed at improving the quality of goals written by clinicians and students of applied behavior analysis. Overall, this study showed that for at least some participants, the independent variable improved the quality of skill acquisition goals, as measured by expert and advanced practitioner ratings as well as self‐assessed ratings. Both experiments yielded statistically significant increases in both dependent variables for the experimental group, when compared to the control group. These promising initial findings have implications for practitioners who hope to adequately plan for the future of those they serve by targeting those skills that will positively affect outcomes.

中文翻译：

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改善为自闭症患者制定的目标：评估成年期意义和相关性的初步结果

一般来说，患有自闭症谱系障碍的人在成年后几乎所有评估指标的结果都很差。不良结果在一定程度上可能与成年前的规划不充分有关，包括目标设定不适当、沟通无效以及为规划提供信息所需的所有决策者的参与不足。研究表明，该谱系个体的技能会直接影响结果的轨迹。然而，目前几乎没有经过同行评审的文献可以确定基于证据的程序来教导从业者如何编写将对这些结果产生积极影响的有意义的目标。因此，本研究检验了旨在提高临床医生和应用行为分析学生制定的目标质量的治疗方案的效果。总体而言，这项研究表明，至少对于某些参与者来说，自变量提高了技能获取目标的质量，这是通过专家和高级从业者评分以及自我评估评分来衡量的。与对照组相比，这两个实验的实验组的两个因变量均出现了统计上显着的增加。这些有希望的初步发现对于那些希望通过针对那些会对结果产生积极影响的技能来充分规划其服务对象的未来的从业者来说具有重要意义。