Other

The study questionnaire included the following measures. The Empowerment Among Users of Mental Health Services Scale; the Herth Hope Index, Perceived obstacles to work; and behaviours indicating nearness to the labour market. This questionnaire was usually completed during an approximately one hour face to face interview. The first was completed at baseline and another at follow up (12 months later).Statistically significant differences were tested. Analysis of variance was also used. SPSS 15.0 was used to analyze all data.

After acceptance into the study the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale was conducted. Interviews were also conducted at baseline and then every 6 months over two and half years. Questions related to symptoms, jobs, hospitalizations and more. Program staff tracked job information. Employment data was also provided by staff or through interviews with participants. Each participant was followed for the study period or until he or she exited services. Time based analyses compared weekly employment and job placement rates for participants in each group. Binary employment outcomes were analyzed with generalized estimating equations of the Genmod procedure in SAS with a logit link function. Another group of job based analyses was also conducted to examine average job duration, hours and wages to compare outcomes from participants in the two groups. Spearman rank-order correlations between job duration, hours and wages were estimated to identify potential covariates in the hours and wages test model.

The study collected data on patient employment and behaviors from the following sources: baseline interviews of patients prior to before random assignment; patient follow-up interviews at 6, 12, and 18 months later using the same procedure as the baseline but adding measures about the intervention; review of vocational activities log kept by both CES and standard counselors as well as employment documentation. The employment measures drew on and integrated information from these sources since no single source was completed using the combined ordinal outcome measure, the initial analysis was a cross-tabulation of the highest level of vocational activity attained by study condition using the combined ordinal outcome measure. Next, cross-tabulations were conducted between experimental condition and four separate indices of vocational outcomes. Pearson chi square provided the tests of statistical significance across the board. Since the hypotheses involving vocational outcomes were directional predictions (i.e., better outcomes were predicted for the experimental group), single-tailed significance tests were reported. Four dichotomous measures of vocational activities, which constitute the outcome measures for this analysis, were obtained at baseline and at 6-month follow-up: 1. Whether the patient attained any paid job in the previous 6 months. 2. Whether the patient attained a competitive job in the previous 6 months. 3. Whether the patient attained an informal job in the previous 6 months. 4. Whether the patient participated in any other socially constructive, vocationally relevant activity in the previous 6 months. The three basic vocational measures (i.e., competitive, informal, constructive activity) were not significantly associated with each other (p>0.05). To provide a single overall index of vocational outcomes, they were combined into a four-level, ordinal measure of highest level of vocational attainment: 1. Attained a competitive job (highest). 2. Attained an informal job. 3. Performed constructive activity other than paid employment. 4. None of the above (lowest).

Characteristics of study participants and interventions were summarized. Descriptive statistics were used to report study outcomes. No meta analysis was conducted.

This included data from the NLTS2 Waves 1 to Wave 4 parent/youth phone interview and/or mail survey data (Wave 1 was collected in the 2000–2001; Wave 2 was collected in the 2002–2003; Wave 3 was collected in the 2004–2005; and Wave 4 was collected in the 2006–2007 school years) and Wave 1 to Wave 2 school program survey data (Wave 1 was collected in the 2001–2002 and Wave 2 was collected in the 2003–2004 school years). The information was gathered for the first time in the 2000–2001 school year and last time in the 2006–2007 school year. SAS 9.2 was used for statistical analyses. All the data used had no missing values. The cases containing missing values were removed. Variables were described using descriptive statistics. Continuous variables, values were reported as means ± standard deviations (SDs). Categorical variables, values were reported as percents. A three-step process was used to determine the factors significantly associated with participation in employment for students with autism.