Exploring the Impact of Vygotsky in Pre-School Autism

Background: Vygotsky’s theory of development has implications for learning and development in autism. With the emphasis on social learning and the role of others, Vygotsky’s social-constructivist theory emphasises the collaborative social context in development. However, Vygotsky’s theory has not been applied within the context of autism.

Objectives: An exploration of the influence of caregiver play on child play, both concurrently and over time, was conducted to test the applicability of Vygotsky’s notion of a Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD).

Methods: 93 caregiver-child dyads were recruited; 49 of the children had a diagnosis of core autism. The remaining children were matched to the children with autism based on gender and non-verbal development. The children were aged between one and five at time one. Dyads were seen three times within 13 months (T1, T2, T3). Caregiver and child play were coded continuously from ten minutes of free play. Six levels of child play were coded; simple exploratory, cause and effect, game and bubble, simple functional, advanced functional and symbolic. The same levels were coded in the caregiver with an additional category of facilitating. A novel statistical technique, based on that of Pennington et al (2009), was used to account for the interdependency between the play variables whilst controlling for chronological age and SES.

Results: Between group differences were explored in children with and without autism. At T2 the differences found in game and bubble play (heightened in the autism sample) were predicted by caregiver play of this kind at both T1 and T2.  Simple exploratory play differences (heightened in the autism group) were not predicted by any caregiver play behaviours.  At both T2 and T3, caregiver advanced functional play (in combination with child language) predicted advanced functional play differences in the child (heightened in typical development). Concurrent caregiver play (combined with child variables) predicted child symbolic play differences at T3 (heightened in typical development).

Reduction in exploratory play over time was seen in both autism and typically developing group. This reduction was not related to any caregiver variables. Increase in advanced functional play over time in both groups was related to the amount of advanced functional play shown by the caregiver at the previous timepoint. Reduction of symbolic play in Autism from T2- T3 was predicted solely by the amount of symbolic play shown by caregivers at T2 – in inverse fashion.

Conclusions: Different results here are compatible with both Piaget’s and Vygotsky’s theory of play; with support for dyadic notions of a ZPD in more advanced forms of play but also children as ‘lone scientists’ for simple forms of play. Caregiver play that was too complex produced an inverse effect on child development in this area, indicating a sensory overload and mirroring previous findings in typically developing children (Tamis-LeMonda and Bornstein, 1994). ‘Game and bubble’ play in autism were highly reliant on caregiver input. The results indicate a complex interplay between child play, caregiver play and developmental variables and important implications for the role of caregivers in play and interventions.