News and Updates

EMERGE study to explore language trajectories of low-income, ethnically diverse children with Autism.

Featured Article on EMERGE

this article originally from University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Connie Kasari interviewed in Kazakhstan, discussing children with autism.

2024 (Video only available in Kazakh)

Synaptic Podcast: Social Communication and Developmental Disorders with Connie Kasari

2023 (Audio only)

INSAR: An Interview with Dr. Connie Kasari

2023

TAND: Early Interventions

2022

The Development of Play in Children with Autism

2022 (With the Virginia Commonwealth University Rehabilitation Research and Training Center)

KASARI LAB Websites

Outside Resources

JASPER can be combined with other interventions and incorporated into diverse environments like inclusion and special education classrooms and everyday activities in the homeπŸ‘πŸ›πŸšŒπŸŽˆβ€οΈ
JASPER was created to be accessible for those in a community setting. Whether you are a clinician, parent, or educator, you may already have everything you need. If toys are limited or we don't have exactly what we need, we love to get creative. Here
JASPER is most commonly delivered one-on-one with an interventionist and a child with ASD. It has been successfully implemented by caregivers, paraprofessionals, teachers, and other community members. Recent studies have explored using JASPER strateg
JASPER is designed for children 12 months old through early childhood, and for older children who have minimal spoken language. JASPER may also be effective for children with ASD and other developmental disorders who experience challenges in engageme
Quiz TimeπŸ’­πŸ§πŸ’¬πŸ§ Put your knowledge to the test!πŸ˜‰ Let us know how you didπŸ§‘πŸ’šπŸŽˆ ANSWERS Slide 1: Response. This is a response, because the child is answering the adult’s prompt.  Slide 2 and 3: Initiation. The child is initiating new
How do we encourage a child to initiate without prompting or directing? The answer is to provide many meaningful opportunities for the child to share during the interaction! Make sure the environment is set up to support the child’s engagement.
Children with ASD are often capable responders. They have an easier time answering questions and responding to prompts, but they often need more support to become confident initiators. In JASPER, we want children to be fluent in both of these roles,
In JASPER, we help children strengthen their skills of initiating with others. Children with ASD have a harder time initiating compared to responding (Mundy et al., 1986), so this is an important skill to focus on as they communicate, play, and engag
There is a complementary relationship among the JASPER domains. Engagement and regulation are crucial for learning play and communication, and the strategies that support play and social communication in turn support the child’s regulation and
Regulation is an important domain in JASPER, because play, communication, and engagement are only possible if a child is regulated and ready to learn. While dysregulation is common among young children, we know that children with autism have greater