If you’re the parent of a child with autism, you’ve probably gotten introduced to multiple treatments and therapy options that their primary care doctor or other parents recommended. If you’re feeling overwhelmed and confused by the various types of effective therapies, we’re here to help make the journey easier. We’ll explore the differences between ABA therapy and occupational therapy to help you decide what’s best for your child.

ABA Therapy

Applied behavioral analysis therapy, or ABA, focuses on behaviors, skill learning, and interaction with the environment. ABA can help improve skills in multiple areas, including communication, identifying social cues, play skills, and daily activities.

ABA therapy is highly individualized, meaning the therapist works closely with you and your child to create a treatment plan to ensure they meet their specific needs. Research has found that this therapy is effective and produces life-long results.

Occupational Therapy

Occupational therapy, or OT, helps children with autism improve their self-care, social, emotional, fine motor, and gross motor skills. The primary way children improve these skills is through playing.

Occupational therapists use various methods to work on the child’s personal goals and break down tasks to determine which skills are more challenging and how to address them while being playful.

What Are Some Similarities?

ABA therapy and occupational therapy work hard to identify challenging skills for some children to improve. Both treatments focus on breaking down a task and working towards reaching the end goal of developing the skill sets and behavior in children with autism.

What’s the Difference?

The main difference between occupational therapy and ABA therapy is the method of achieving the end goal of enforcing positive behaviors. OT helps children learn new skills through play, while ABA helps children learn more skills through modifying their behavior. ABA is more systematic and uses an evaluative model to identify positive and negative behaviors in your child. Occupational therapy focuses on developing playful skills.

How Can We Help?

Finding the best form of therapy for your child is important, and we would love to lend our helping hands at HANDS Center for Autism. We offer autism pediatric therapy with the expertise of our talented and beloved team of child behavioral therapists. If you have any questions about our therapy options or would like additional information, don’t hesitate to contact us today!