Psychological correction of perception in children with autistic spectrum disorders as a condition of socially acceptable behaviourforming

Contact: Naydonova Ganna, PhD of psychology, associate professor special psychology and medicine in Dragomanov National Pedagogical University, Kyiv, Ukraine. Academic interests: problems of bodily psychology, health psychology, sexual psychology, special psychology.

Nagirnyak Anastasiya, practical psychologist, The Center of Child Development “Me+Family”, 4th year student in Dragomanov National Pedagogical University. Academic interests: problems of socialization of children with ASD, problems of self-esteem in children with intellectual disability, art-therapy application in psychological correction of emotional sphere of children with psychophysical peculiarities. 

Inclusive education in the broad sense involves the development of equal opportunities for all categories of children in Ukraine. Inclusion of a child with developmental problems in society is ensured not only by the creation of special external conditions, but also by taking into account the child and working with those personal aspects that cause socialization difficulties. The most acute issue is the question of the inclusion of children with autistic spectrum disorders (ASD), which is due to the increase in the number of autistic children around the world and the lack of proven scientific paradigms on the etiology of this deviation. Therefore, most of the studies are aimed to find out the causes of autism, but the mental processes of autistic children remain much less studied, and especially the perceptual disorders that lead to socially inappropriate behavior that creates the greatest difficulty in integrating such children into society. In this article, mechanisms of socially inappropriate behavior’s causation that are associated with perceptual disorders in children with ASD are revealed. As a result of the study, a comprehensive psychocorrectional program was developed. Its aim was correction of the process of perceiving and replacing undesirable behaviors on socially acceptable behaviors as the basis for the socialization of children with ASD. Our correctional program was based on the postulates of behavioural therapy, the complexity principle in a psychological correction, which means not only engagement of different experts into the correctional work and interdependence of psychical processes, but the complexity approach with taking into account all relevant aspects for achieving effective results.

Key words: psychological correction, perception, autism, socialization, behavioural disorders, unwelcome behaviour, correctional program