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Sensory processing related to attention in children with ASD, ADHD, or typical development: results from the ELENA cohort

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Abstract

Autism-spectrum disorder (ASD) and attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) are early neurodevelopmental conditions that share clinical characteristics, raising important issues in clinical diagnosis. We aimed to compare (1) sensory processing in four groups of children: ASD alone, ASD + ADHD, ADHD alone, and typical development (TD) and (2) the association between sensory processing and attention in the three groups with neurodevelopmental disorders. Our sample included 120 children aged from 6 to 12 years divided into four groups: ASD alone (N = 43), ASD + ADHD (N = 18), ADHD alone (N = 28), and TD (N = 31). Atypical sensory processing was more frequent in ASD and/or ADHD than in TD, without a significant difference between ASD and ADHD. However, the variance analysis of attention problems revealed differences between the ADHD and ASD groups. Thus, the rate of atypical sensory processing was comparable between the ASD and ADHD groups, suggesting that further studies are needed to explore atypical SP in all neurodevelopmental disorders.

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Acknowledgements

We thank the contributing families, the ELENA cohort staff (Myriam Soussana, Julie Loubersac, Ela Miniarikova, Flore Couty and Lee Audras-Torrent) and the clinical team of Montpellier hospital. We express gratitude to the CNSA and DGOS, for funding to conduct this research and prepare the results for publication. A special thank to Julie Loubersac and Dalil Hamroun for their technological assistance.

Funding

This study was supported by a grant from the French Ministry of Health (ELENA, PHRC-N-2013-Project Number: 13-0232) and CNSA. Additional support was provided by the CHU of Montpellier (AOI). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.

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Contributions

FD conceived of the study, contributed in collection, analysis, and interpretation of the data and drafted the manuscript; AB is the PI of ELENA cohort, she also participated in the design of the current study, drafted the work and revised it critically for main intellectual content; CV participated in the design of the study and contributed to revised it critically. CM and M-CP analyzed and interpreted data; FM and NB revised critically the final manuscript. All authors read and approved the final version to be published.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Amaria Baghdadli.

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The authors have no conflict of interest to declare.

Ethical approval

The study and informed consent procedure have been approved by the Ethics Committee on the Research of Human Subjects at Marseille Mediterranean (CNIL. number DR-2015-393).

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Signed informed consent is obtained from all participating families.

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Dellapiazza, F., Michelon, C., Vernhet, C. et al. Sensory processing related to attention in children with ASD, ADHD, or typical development: results from the ELENA cohort. Eur Child Adolesc Psychiatry 30, 283–291 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00787-020-01516-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00787-020-01516-5

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