Multi-site Animal Assisted Intervention for Children With DD and Their Family Dog (DAID)

Oregon State University (OSU)

Status: Active, not recruiting

Conditions: Physical Activity; Social Wellbeing

Treatments: Behavioral: Do As I Do (DAID) dog training

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT04799119

IRB-2020-0816

Details and patient eligibility

About

The study purpose is to evaluate a novel multidisciplinary approach to fostering a therapeutic partnership between the participants with developmental disabilities and the participants family dog. This will culminate in an Animal Assisted Intervention aimed at increasing activity levels, enhancing social support, and increasing feeling of responsibility and wellbeing within this population.

Full description

The goal of this proposal is to evaluate a large scale novel multidisciplinary approach to fostering atherapeutic partnership between adolescents with developmental disabilities (DD) and the participants family dog. The investigators will evaluate imitative 'Do As I Do' (DAID) training into a unique Animal Assisted Intervention (AAI) aimed at increasing activity levels, enhancing social support by promoting a stronger dog-human bond, and increasing feelings of responsibility and wellbeing within this population.

The investigators propose to address the critical need for empirical evaluation of novel theoretically based multi-site animal assisted interventions through the following specific aims.

Specific Aim 1: To evaluate a novel multi-site DAID dog training intervention to promote physical activity in adolescents with developmental disabilities.

Specific Aim 2: To evaluate the impact of a multi-site DAID intervention on the adolescent's quality of life and feelings of social wellbeing.

Specific Aim 3: To evaluate the impact of a multi-site DAID intervention on the child-dog relationship and mutual wellbeing.

Participant Population: Adolescent participants with a developmental disability, between the ages of 10-17 years will be recruited through community-based programs/organizations associated with children with DDs in around our sites. A DD will be confirmed through parent report (e.g., initial recruitment conversations, and documented through the initial demographic questionnaire).

Enrollment: 100 estimated patients

Sex: All

Ages: 10 to 17 years old

Volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• Age 10-17 years
• Developmental disability (per parental report)
• Possesses family dog
• Participant can follow basis instructions.

Exclusion criteria

• Cannot follow basic instructions.
• Non english-speakers.

Trial design

Primary purpose: Treatment

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

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100 participants in 2 patient groups

DAID dog training

Experimental group

Description:

'Do As I Do' (DAID) dog training employs operant conditioning to train dogs to copy the behavior of their owner upon hearing the verbal cue 'Do it', similar to teaching a dog the rules behind the game 'Simon Says'. Once this rule has been established and generalized, something that can be achieved in dogs by practicing with only 3-6 initially learned behaviors, owners can demonstrate new actions and use the cue 'Do it' to prompt a matched, imitative, behavioral response.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Do As I Do (DAID) dog training

Control

No Intervention group

Description:

No intervention (waitlisted and will be provided with the experimental condition post-study completion).