The early social and communicative development of very young siblings of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is the focus of the current study. Three groups of children were included: (1) young children diagnosed with ASD, (2) younger siblings in families with a somewhat older child with ASD, and (3) young typically developing children. All children participated in a videotaped, structured interactional procedure called the Early Social Communication Scales (ESCS; [Mundy & Hogan, 1996, A Preliminary Manual for the Abridged Early Social Communication Scales (ESCS) Unpublished manual, University of Miami]). Very young siblings were compared to young children with a diagnosed autism spectrum disorder and to a group of young typically developing children. Results indicated that, on three of four of the ESCS subscales, the social communicative behaviors of the younger siblings differed from those of the typically developing children but not from the behaviors displayed by the ASD group. Genetic vulnerability for ASD among siblings and characteristics of family interaction may explain the level of impairment observed in the very young siblings of children with autism spectrum disorders.
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Acknowledgements
This study was supported by a grant from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD); Contract grant number: HD 35458 (M.A. Spence, Principal Investigator). Special thanks to: Lee Mays, Pam Flodman, Makiko Tanabe, Michelle Yang, Julie Endres, Jennifer Ferrouge at UC Irvine, and Michael Siller at UCLA. Portions of this manuscript were presented in a poster at the April 2002 meeting of the Western Psychological Association, Irvine, California.
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Goldberg, W.A., Jarvis, K.L., Osann, K. et al. Brief Report: Early Social Communication Behaviors in the Younger Siblings of Children with Autism. J Autism Dev Disord 35, 657–664 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-005-0009-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-005-0009-6