Early intervention for children with intellectual disabilities: Current knowledge and future prospects

The field of early intervention is vibrant, generating expectations that systematic, comprehensive, experien-tially based interventions will alter developmental tra-jectories and prevent secondary complications. In this article, the existing knowledge base in the field is reviewed. It emphasizes the importance of an overall developmental framework, what is known through intervention science and the emergence of guiding prin-ciples for programme design and development. This is followed by a discussion of future prospects for improv-ing early intervention outcomes in four areas. First, the importance of designing studies that provide informa-tion about carefully defined subgroups is discussed. This issue of specificity of outcomes is crucial in order to determine boundaries for effectiveness and to direct attention to areas of special concern. Second, prospects for translational research are discussed with particular reference to our knowledge of the core developmental processes affected. Third, the need to focus on the increasingly apparent mental health and social compet-ence difficulties of even young children with intellectual disabilities is considered. Finally, the complex problems and potential solutions associated with the transfer of model intervention programmes to communities as part of early intervention systems are described