**Author details**

a child to approach an adult and request for a desired object using a picture not only improved communication but also developed social interaction. Successful outcome of each attempt reinforced a child's communicative behaviour. The performance of the experimental group children on FLAS was significantly higher than those in the control group. The control group children also attended school and received speech and language intervention. Notwithstand‐ ing that they belonged to the same age group, the intervention goals would essentially consist of teaching similar language concepts, the control group children did not demonstrate gains equal to their experimental group counterparts. The principles of applied behaviour analysis is central to the PECS program. The ABA methods such as rewards and prompts are system‐ atically used to shape a child's verbal behaviour though out the program, and much more rigorously in the initial phases. The ABA methods were used during the intervention period. This adherence to ABA principles might not be existing in the language interventions given to the control group children. Hence, as the children were not frequently rewarded or guided to produce correct response of identifying pictures, their gain on receptive language was below the children who received PECS training. Similarly, with respect to expressive language skills, in the traditional intervention setting the emphasis was on naming the picture orally. This might have been impacted their learning as the control group children like their peers in the experimental group were nonverbal or minimally verbal. The positive gains by the experi‐ mental group might be attributed to PECS training. That the change in ability to communicate was beyond the intervention settings was evidenced by parents, and borne by the positive

correlation between observations made by the researchers and that by the parents.

Difficulties in social relationships and interactions have been the defining features of autism. Therapists and teachers frequently use augmentative communication systems with children with autism to support development of interactive behaviour. AAC systems follow a topo‐ graphically based taxonomy. Some are selection-based systems in which each response is topographically identical and others are topography-based systems in which each response is topographically distinct [28]. PECS being a selection based system follows a topographically identical (e.g. card selection and exchange) pattern. It suits the literal thinking ability of a child with autism. The pictures and symbols are static, literal and clear, and enable children with autism to process information easily. The outcome of this study substantiate the findings of previous researches supporting use of PECS as a suitable augmentative communication system

The authors express their thanks to the children and parents who participated in this study.

They are grateful to the school administrators for their support.

**9. Conclusion**

228 Autism Spectrum Disorder - Recent Advances

for children with autism.

**Acknowledgements**

Rubina Lal1\* and Disha Sanghvi2


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