The use of BRIAC for evaluating therapeutic effectiveness

Forty-six children in eight different psychotherapeutic settings were evaluated at the beginning and at the end of a 12-month period by means of the Behavior Rating Instrument for Autistic Children (BRIAC). The younger children (3 to 6 years of age) were initially more severely disturbed and improved significantly more than the older children (7 to 9 years of age). The large, bleak, custodial residential center produced significantly less improvement in the children than did the other settings. However, among good programs—i.e., those which were sensitive to the behaviors and needs of the children and which were skillfully implemented by a dedicated and attentive staff—there was little evidence of differences in therapeutic effectiveness regardless of whether the therapy was behavior modification, education, psychoanalytically oriented relationship therapy, or activity therapy.