Research Project Dolphin Assisted Therapy with 13 autistic children at Melka Excelsior Hotel Lovina Bali / 20 - 24 August 2007

The 13 autistic boys - aged between 4 and 15 years - had during their stay at
Melka Excelsior Hotel Bali Lovina at least 4 dolphin therapy sessions each. The main aim in those dolphin encounters has been that the kids enjoy to be with dolphins and we could observe certain changes in their attitudes over the time here.
At the end of the workshop we presented to the parents an evaluation sheet where they had to circle their opinion how much change in the kids bahavior they had found.

We observed 8 differnet categories:

- Communication
- Emotional change
- Attention span
- Confidence and self esteem
- Motor Skills (gross or fine)
- Co-ordination
- Eye contact
- Calming down

On a scale of 0 to 5 the changes had to be marked - where
0 stands for NO CHANGE & 5 for HIGHEST RESULT

After the therapy sessions we can say clearly:
Most changes took effect in Confidence/Self Esteem and Eye Contact because this was the most evident for all observers (all together 137 points).
Also the communication and motor skills did increase quite significant (133 points)
The Attention Span with 129 points and the emotional change with 125 points hold the middle range of changes in the dolphin therapy where as the calming down effect seems apparent but ranges together with better coordination on the end of the scale (123 points).

For an autistic child is self esteem and confidence together with communication and focus very important. Our study shows significant changes in those main fields.

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