Feasibility of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy via Telehealth with Parents of Children with Autism: A Pilot Study

• Published in: Journal of child and family studies Vol. 34; no. 5; pp. 1292 - 1306
• Main Authors: Tilson, Chana, Khawar, Sadaf, Griffith, Annette K.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York Springer US 01.05.2025; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Acceptance; Acceptance and commitment therapy; Autistic children; Behavior modification; Behavior Problems; Behavior therapy; Behavioral Science and Psychology; Child and School Psychology; Child Behavior; Child Development; Child Rearing; Cognition & reasoning; Coping; Depression (Psychology); Developmental Disabilities; Emotional regulation; Emotions; Families & family life; Family Environment; Feasibility; Flexibility; Internalization; Intervention; Mental depression; Mental disorders; Mental health; Meta Analysis; Metacognition; Mindfulness; Negative Reinforcement; Original Paper; Pandemics; Parent Child Relationship; Parent Influence; Parental stress; Parenthood education; Parents & parenting; Pilot projects; Psychological flexibility; Psychological Patterns; Psychology; Self care; Social Behavior; Social Development; Social Environment; Social Sciences; Sociology; Stress; Telemedicine; Training; Usefulness; Well being; Young Children; Autism; ACT; Asynchronous; Parent training
• ISSN: 1062-1024; 1573-2843
• DOI: 10.1007/s10826-025-03045-8

We used a within-subject group design to examine the effects of a six-week Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) training program delivered asynchronously for parents of children with autism. Each weekly session included specific topics and exercises on: (a) values identification; (b) present moment awareness; (c) defusion; (d) the Matrix (moving toward/away); (e) committed action; and (f) self-care. Pretest and posttest measures were completed by the participants which assessed depression, emotion dysregulation, parental stress, psychological flexibility and child internalizing and externalizing behaviors. Results indicated that depression, parental stress, and psychological flexibility improved for the participants post-intervention, but that there were no statistically significant decreases noted for emotion regulation or child behavior. Based on feedback from the social validity questionnaire, majority of the parents endorsed usefulness of the intervention modality and indicated interest in continued use of the ACT strategies.