Estudio de un caso de mutismo selectivo: evaluación e intervención en el contexto escolar

Children with selective mutism present a complicated set of symptoms, as they not only refuse to speak in certain social situations (e.g. at school), despite talking in others, but also appear shy and anxious, and often suffer problems associated with overprotective families and/or bilinguism. In this case we have studied an 8-year-old male with selective mutism, who has attended school since he was 3 years old and does not speak at school. The objective was to enable the child to communicate orally with different people in different settings at the school. We used behavioural therapy techniques such as: Relaxation and breathing techniques, stimulus fading, self modeling and positive reinforcement. The treatment program was very positive because the boy has now begun to speak to different people at the school. Nevertheless we recommend that more work be done because the pupil only spoke to his teacher once during which he was in a state of high muscle and autonomic activation.