Establishing derived textual control in activity schedules with children with autism.

Activity schedules are often used to facilitate task engagement and transition for children with autism. This study evaluated whether conditional discrimination training would serve to transfer the control from activity-schedule pictures to printed words (i.e., derived textual control). Two preschoolers with autism were taught to select pictures and printed words given their dictated names. Following training, participants could respond to printed words by completing the depicted task, match printed words to pictures, and read printed words without explicit training (i.e., emergent relations).