Teaching Important Relational Skills for Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder and Intellectual Disability Using Freely Available (GO-IRAP) Software

The current article is a brief summary of recent research in relational responding with an emphasis on the Ghent Odysseus Implicit Relational Assessment Procedure (GO-IRAP) for teaching this important skill to children with diagnosed autism. Relational responding, especially derived (emergent, untaught) relational responding is thought to be related to complex human cognition such as language and other symbolic understanding (e.g., algebra, maths). Research has indicated that fluent and flexible relational responding is correlated with higher scores on standardized ability/ IQ tests, and that even quite complex relational skills may be taught to children with autism using Multiple Exemplar Training (MET) with other behavioural principles such as positive reinforcement. The GO-IRAP is an interactive computerised teaching programme conceptualized by Professor Dermot Barnes-Holmes and colleagues, which has been made freely available to practitioners and parents. This is a teaching tool designed to assess and teach relational responding from basic nonarbitrary/ physically-based relations such as coordination (same-different), comparison (greater-lesser), opposition, temporal (before-after, hierarchy, deictic relations (I-YOU), and arbitrary relations (.50=50%; X=Y) including Derived Relational Responding (DRR; teach A is greater-than B and B is greater-than, test if child derives (untaught) B is smaller than A, C is smaller than A, A is bigger than C). The current article provides some examples of the diverse relations that can be taught, and stimuli and feedback that can be presented; notably, ongoing research with the GO-IRAP may bring further refinements