Name: Aeriel Lin
Class Year: 2024
Major: Psychology
Minor: East Asian Languages and Cultures & Film Studies
Hometown: Singapore
Internship Organization: Lazarus Centre
Job Title: Research and Clinical Intern
Location: Singapore
What's happening at your internship? We would love to hear what kind of work you are doing!
For summer 2023, I am a research and clinical intern at Lazarus Centre, an early intervention center that specializes in delivering ABA therapy services to young children with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) and educational therapy for those with dyslexia, ADHD, and other learning disorders. In the mornings, I work on developing and creating educational materials (reading and comprehension worksheets) to be utilized for dyslexia students during their classes. In the afternoons, I work directly in the centre to provide ABA therapy whilst teaching children personalized educational content. Under supervision, I also conduct extensive research on past studies and journal articles to support the development of my supervisor’s study. The objective is to accumulate sufficient research before moving forward with a formal real-life study. Successful outcomes from this investigation would not only enable the clinic to serve children above 30 months more effectively but also reduce reliance on the M-CHAT-R/F. Furthermore, this research has a future goal of establishing original peer-reviewed interventions that cater to a broader age range of children and contribute to licensing optimization. I have to deal with an endless stream of active children in the afternoons, but just seeing the solidarity between my colleagues as they talk about funny incidents that occurred during their sessions made it all worthwhile.
Why did you apply for this internship?
The overarching commitment of the company is to provide evidence-based interventions for children with learning difficulties, which are often inaccessible in mainstream educational settings. Working in actual settings with real patients are especially difficult to find if one does not have the certification to be engaging in ABA therapy. Hence, the intern has to be closely supervised when engaging with sessions with the children and it requires much contribution from the company. Opportunities like these are few and far between, especially for psychology and neuroscience. I did not want to pass up the chance to be able to lay my hands on multiple aspects of research, clinical and educational psychology.
Can you talk about the skills you are learning and why they are important to you?
During my internship, I am fortunate to have two supervisors who are clinical directors to guide my work. One specializes in educational psychology, and another is a behaviour analyst. Together, we collaboratively engage with the center's specializations in education therapy for dyslexia and autism, respectively. Through hands-on experiences, I learn to understand the effectiveness of adhering exclusively to evidence-based practices, such as applied behavioural analysis (ABA). This is unique as many other intervention clinics prefer to engage in multiple practices. Furthermore, the center establishes a baseline for each child by conducting standardized testing upon their entry and continuously measures their progress over time. I have learnt about the applications of standardized testing in classes and labs, but seeing it being applied in a real-life setting really helps to provide a better foundation of what it entails. One significant project I am involved in revolves around developing a new intervention for education therapy specifically tailored to children with Autism above 30 months of age. Currently, the clinic utilizes the Modified Checklist for Autism in Toddlers (M-CHAT) and its revision, the M-CHAT-R with Follow-Up (M-CHAT-R/F), under a licensing agreement with Dr. Diana Robins, the director of the A.J. Drexel Autism Institute. However, there is a need to address cases where children are flagged as at-risk but may not receive an ASD diagnosis. My role involves conducting extensive research on past studies and journal articles to support the development of his study. The objective is to accumulate sufficient research before moving forward with a formal real-life study. Successful outcomes from this investigation would not only enable the clinic to serve children above 30 months more effectively but also reduce reliance on the M-CHAT-R/F. Furthermore, this research has a future goal of establishing original peer-reviewed interventions that cater to a broader age range of children and contribute to licensing optimization. My exposure to reviewing journal articles in my lab classes aided in my adaptation to applying them for an actual study. ABA therapy plays a pivotal role in teaching new skills, fostering socially desirable behaviors, and reducing undesirable ones. As an intern, I am actively involved in observing and understanding the positive reinforcement strategies employed at each step to promote effective learning in children. This includes learning about various domains such as social and communication skills, language development, motor skills, imitation skills, self-help skills, cognitive skills, play skills, and comprehending how and why these methods are applied to address each child's unique needs.
Was this internship what you expected it to be?
I came into this internship with the idea that I would be exposed to a range of experiences that are limited to a certain extent. As an undergraduate, I expected less responsibilities with sensitive work and data because of my inexperience. However, the company provided and trusted me to engage with their clients and their study with no restrictions. For example, I learnt how to screen and analyze basic linguistic and functional skills of children with developmental delays or disabilities through one-to-one and group sessions. As the clinic strives to develop additional interventions, they listened to my past insights from my previous experiences working with children with developmental and visual disorders at Overbrook to better aid in their direction. The practical knowledge gained from those experiences complements my internship at the Lazarus Centre and significantly enhances my learning in the real world. Additionally, I am being exposed to the integration of parents into the program through initiatives like parent intervention naturalistic environment training. During my academic years at BMC, I learned that my interest lies within the clinical and educational fields. From my previous internship experience as a talent acquisition intern at a financial technology company to doing marine research in Fiji, it is evident that I feel more fulfilled in engaging in a position that impacts others more directly. Having taken multiple relevant classes, from clinical psychology to several advanced clinical courses, to my praxis work at Overbrook, and working on AI facial emotion recognition technology and its impact on mental health, elderly care, and social service with Opsis, I knew the direction I could potentially see myself in the future. I was worried about whether I would feel unfulfilled with this internship, but it became more than what I expected it to be. Plus, it somehow manages to expand yet ties in nicely with all my previous experiences. It was the right choice!
Visit the Summer Internship Stories page to read more about student internship experiences.