Dr Joseph Allan Sakdalan1
1Forensicare
Abstract:
Despite some advances in the assessment and treatment of autism spectrum disorder
(ASD), there remains a paucity of intervention and research literature providing treatment to autistic adults with co-occurring mental health conditions. There is growing evidence supporting a relationship between the core features of ASD and emotion dysregulation. This paper aims to provide a better understanding of dialectical behaviour therapy (DBT) concepts and skills and their application in the treatment of adults with ASD who display offending behaviours.
Research supported overlapping symptoms between ASD and BPD and that ASD traits had a significant impact on clinical features and manifestations of BPD.
This highlights the emotion dysregulation issue that is a core issue with BPD and ASD. A DBT-informed treatment approach can be considered promising in addressing issues for ASD individuals, particularly those with offending behaviours. DBT incorporates different elements of applied behaviour analysis, cognitive behavioural therapy, mindfulness skills, sensory-based treatments, psychosocial interventions and emotion regulation skills, which makes it a more cohesive and integrated approach to treatment. DBT can be considered a more integrated, strengths-based, habilitative and trauma-informed approach which can be promising in its application to address challenging behaviours or offending in ASD individuals. This paper will use a case vignette to demonstrate the use of adapted and reconceptualised DBT concepts and skills with an ASD individual with challenging and/or offending behaviours. Future research can focus on evaluating the effectiveness of the different DBT concepts and skills and the different DBT modules to determine which program components are particularly useful for this client group.