Abstract
A 6-month follow-up of an individual reported to engage in validated facilitated communication (FC) is presented. Three main issues are addressed: the current status of the individual's FC use, the effect of food reinforcers on his communicative ability, and a comparison of FC to the Picture Exchange Communication System (PECS). Results indicated that the individual did not engage in any validated FC, that performance was equivalent on food and nonfood trials, and that PECS was the preferred mode of communication, yielding 100% accuracy in a message-passing, object identification task. Implications of these findings are discussed in the context of an individual's right to communicate by objectively validated methods.
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The authors especially thank Student 7, his family, and staff for agreeing to participate in this follow-up study. We also thank Sherrie Schlecker and Carole Nebhut for serving as judges, Joyce Lentz for assistance in literature review and David Rappaport for commenting on this manuscript. This study was supported by Elwyn, Incorporated.
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Simon, E.W., Whitehair, P.M. & Toll, D.M. A case study: Follow-up assessment of facilitated communication. J Autism Dev Disord 26, 9–18 (1996). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02276232
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02276232