Chapter V: Conclusion
Implications
There has not been much research conducted on the benefits of parent implementing PECS as a method of communication and how it relates to the decrease in stress levels caused by the miscommunication. This study will help professionals to further analyze this intervention and the correlation that it has to help parents. This implications in this study are important for the participants as it can help to with the prevention of stress levels. This study examined the usage of PECS in children diagnosed with autism as a method of communication to help decrease parental stress caused by the miscommunication. This study confirmed the hypothesis and in fact parents teaching children to use PECS as means of communication does help to reduce the parental stress levels. What this study means for the participants and the professionals is that when parents request services for their children diagnosed with autism and have a similar situation of high stress levels, a known intervention such as PECS will be available. Professionals will be able to offer and discuss the benefits of using PECS to parents as a method of communication.
Limitations
There are several of limitations to this study that cannot be avoided. The first one being that the sample size can be expanded to more participants. The bigger the sample size, the more true of a value and study of the phenomena can be evaluated. The second limitation is the exclusion criteria. Participants have to have communication deficits and be diagnosed with autism. This limitation can exclude participants who only have communication deficits. Parental stress factors can be another limitation, as not all stress will be perceived by not being able to communicate with their child who is non-verbal. Other factors may increase the overall stress levels. Lastly, this research does not focus on the long-term benefits and usage of PECS across different settings and participants. It was mainly focused on a six-month span. Longer intervention would be useful to further analyze the correlation between the usage of PECS and the decrease in stress levels in parents.
Suggestions for Future Research
This study discusses the effectiveness of Picture Exchange Communication System with children diagnosed with autism to help decrease parental stress experience by the miscommunication. Future research can be expanded on including both parents in the participation and implementation of PECS. In addition, the target population can be expanded from various institutions, programs, and facility of implementation. Another suggestion for future research would be for the researchers to have direct contact with the intervention and see if the usage of PECS can be generalized across peers. Generalizing the usage of PECS in different context would be beneficial to analyze the grasping of the concept and the usage of PECS.