Joint Attention involves the ability to share attention to an object or event with another person. We developed this task as an effective assessments of joint attention for school-age children and adolescents. This Joint Attention Task (JTAT), which was normed with individuals ages 7 to 17, usefully discriminated between individuals with and without autism spectrum disorder in our validation sample, and scores in the ASD group were correlated with receptive language, symptomatology, and theory of mind. Inter-rater reliability was high (k = .875). The JTAT requires no special equipment or training. Those interested in utilizing the task are welcome to download the paper and protocol, attached here; please cite Bean & Eigsti, I. M. (2012).

The adolescent Joint Attention Task was developed by Jessica Bean Jaworski, Ph.D., in collaboration with Dr. Eigsti. Dr. Jaworski is a pediatric neuropsychologist at Baystate Medical Center in Springfield, MA, who specializes in working with children with complex medical histories, epilepsy, genetic conditions, and brain tumors/CNS-directed treatment for cancers. Dr. Bean Jaworski can be reached 413-794-1039.