About CV Projects Writing

Teaching the Leisure Skill of Photography to Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Spring 2019

For my senior thesis, I designed and executed a study where eight children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) at an autism center successfully learned how to take pictures as a beneficial leisure skill. The manuscript is currently being edited in preparation for journal submission. As we progress toward submission, this section will be updated accordingly! If you'd like to check out the rough version of this writeup that I submitted as my thesis, you can check it out here

Why did I conduct this study?

• Kids with ASD often do not use their leisure time appropriately, and rather engage in inappropriate actions and maladaptive behaviors (such as engaging in stereotypy and tantrums)
• Establishing age-appropriate leisure skills is important for these kids as these skills have been recognized as fulfilling habilitative needs, and can increase their quality of life

Basically, we wanted kids with ASD to have something constructive to do with their free time, so we taught them a skill (photography) that the kids could do alone, with their free time!