Anxiety symptoms across the lifespan in people diagnosed with Autistic Disorder
Section snippets
Participants
The participants in this study included 131 toddlers (ages 17–36 months; the toddler group), children (ages 3–16 years; the child group), and adults (ages 20–65 years) diagnosed with AD. Due to the large age range of the adult participants, these individuals were divided into two groups based on a median split of age (M = 48 years). Those individuals at the median and below were classified as the young adult group (ages 20–48 years) and those above the median were reclassified as the adult group
Results
A MANCOVA was utilized to assess differences between the toddler, child, young adult, and adult groups on the five overlapping anxiety items with the presence or absence of an intellectual disability as the covariate. The resulting omnibus effect was significant, F(15,337) = 2.87, p < .01, Wilks λ = .72. Subsequent inspection of the univariate analyses revealed that the items “sudden, rapid, repetitive movements not associated with a physical disability;” “persistent or reoccurring impulses that
Discussion
Findings from this study are suggestive of several changes in the symptoms and severity of anxiety across the age groups of participants with AD in the current study. Interestingly, symptoms seem to roughly mimic expected developmental milestones, though at a slower pace than that seen in typically developing children. Specifically, it has been argued that the development of anxiety mirrors the cognitive-developmental gains seen in typically developing children with anxiety—as children move
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