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This report presents a quantitative study of facilitated communication. Participants were 12 people living at an institutional autism program and 9 people who provided them with facilitated communication support. These subjects were the 12 most competent producers of facilitated communication in the program. They were shown pictures of familiar objects and asked to type the names of the objects under three conditions: (a) assisted typing with facilitators unaware of the content of the stimulus picture, (b) unassisted typing, and (c) a condition in which the participants and facilitators were each shown pictures at the same time. In this last condition the paired pictures were either the same or different, and the participant's typing was facilitated to label or describe the picture. These participants were unable to succeed in the tasks without facilitator assistance. On trials when the facilitators and participants had different pictures, the only "correct" labels were for pictures shown to the facilitators and not shown to the participants. This finding demonstrates that the facilitators were unknowingly determining what was typed.

The extent of use and effectiveness of special treatment options (in-house behavior shaping units, specialized outside referral agencies, and mobile intensive treatment teams) in dealing with behavior problems of persons with mental retardation was determined. A survey was completed by 144 institutions throughout the United States; 86% of all facilities recognized a need for special treatment options to deal with clients who had severe behavior problems. Sixty-eight percent of the institutions had presently or in the recent past used at least one of the three treatment options. Comparisons of these options in terms of perceived effectiveness, length of intervention, and type of problem addressed were reported.