Brief ReportFeasibility and usability of experience sampling methodology for capturing everyday experiences of individuals with autism spectrum disorders
Section snippets
Methods
The study had approval from the University of Sydney Human Research Ethics Committee and The Autism Spectrum Australia Research Approval Committee. Written consent was obtained from all participants and from parents of participants younger than 18.
Results
The mean signal response rate was 71% (63%–92%), which was considered acceptable. Participants reported device issues and contextual influences as reasons for missing surveys. Beeps were sometimes not loud enough in public places but sometimes considered annoying in quiet places. The mean time spent on survey completion was 1 min 42 s (SD = 52 s), which was considered appropriate.15
All participants reported that the questions were straightforward and that the iOS device and the PIEL App were
Discussion
The short survey, the use of the iOS device and the PIEL App all seemed to support feasibility of the ESM for collecting data on the everyday experiences of adults with ASD. Participants reported that the method did not significantly interfere with their daily routines and that they were able to shift back and forth between the activity they were engaged in and the survey; this was in contrast to the resistance to change found previously with children.30 Feasibility also was reflected in a
Conclusion
This preliminary study supported that the ESM with the PIEL App was feasible and useful in capturing everyday experience of people with ASD. Findings of this study will enable researchers to investigate everyday experiences of this population and may assist with future research with other populations.
Acknowledgments
The study was completed by the first author as part of the requirements for the completion of PhD under supervision of the other authors. The authors would like to acknowledge the Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Sydney for the Mary Frances Stephens Scholarship and Postgraduate Research Support Scheme. The authors also wish to express their gratitude to the people who participated in the research, Autism Spectrum Australia (Aspect) and other autism related associations in Australia for
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2022, Research in Autism Spectrum DisordersCitation Excerpt :This method has been applied to participants with a wide range of psychiatric disorders (Myin-Germeys et al., 2009). Although such research is sparse in participants with ASD, the feasibility and usefulness of this method have been supported in this population (Chen, Bundy, Cordier, & Einfeld, 2014; Kovac, Mosner, Miller, Hanna, & Dichter, 2016). The ESM can be easily combined with salivary samples to measure fluctuations of momentary emotional and biological stress levels (Schlotz, 2019).
Word up – Experiential and neurocognitive evidence for associations between autistic symptomology and a preference for thinking in the form of words
2020, CortexCitation Excerpt :The present study will therefore look for relationships between overall levels of different dimensions of ongoing thought as well as their context-specific regulation to assess whether there are identifiable links to autistic traits in a neurotypical sample of undergraduates. Importantly, several recent studies demonstrate the feasibility of experience sampling in people diagnosed with ASD (Chen et al., 2014, 2015; Cordier et al., 2016), showing that autistic individuals respond at a comparable rate and demonstrating that it is a reliable method for identifying differences in thought patterns during daily life. The extension of MDES to examine autistic traits in a normative population, therefore, provides important information about how ongoing thought relates to autistic traits that could act as a foundation for extending the method into a more clinically relevant population.
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2019, Behaviour Research and TherapyExperience sampling of positive affect in adolescents with autism: Feasibility and preliminary findings
2016, Research in Autism Spectrum DisordersCitation Excerpt :Moreover, multilevel modeling analyses that examine person-specific changes over time are often used to analyze experience sampling datasets. Similar to prior initial studies of experience sampling in ASD (Chen et al., 2014; Chen et al., 2013; Cordier, Brown, Chen, Wilkes-Gillan, & Falkmer, 2014; Khor et al., 2014), we did not analyze our data in this way because of the suboptimal sample size for such an approach (Maas & Hox, 2005), and future studies with larger samples should evaluate the impact of multilevel modeling approaches to data analysis.2 Although there are numerous studies in which high functioning individuals with ASD have reported affective states using self-report instruments (e.g., Sasson et al., 2012; Tseng et al., 2014; White et al., 2014), another potential limitation of the present study is the long-standing issue of the validity of self-report of affective states in ASD (Berthoz & Hill, 2005; Kaat & Lecavalier, 2015), and future research that addresses the correspondence between self- and caregiver-report indices of positive affect in ASD will be needed to address this issue.
Theoretical foundations for the measurement of environmental factors and their impact on participation among people with disabilities
2015, Archives of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation
Partial results were presented at the International Meeting for Autism Research in 2013.
The authors declare that they have no competing interests.