Gender differences in co-morbid psychopathology and clinical management in adults with autism spectrum disorders
Section snippets
Participants
There were 50 females and 100 males with ASD and ID, aged between 16 and 84 years old (mean = 28.5, SD = 10.6) and they were all first time consecutive referrals to a Specialist Mental Health Service for adults with ID in South-East London. Eligibility criteria for this study included diagnosis of autism, mental retardation/intellectual disability and significant social impairment. The largest proportion of referrals came from primary care (47.6%) followed by Generic Mental Health Services (37.4%)
Analysis
The Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS 18) was employed for all the analyses. Simple bivariate comparisons were used to describe the frequencies of psychiatric diagnoses. Statistical comparisons were made by chi-square tests (and t-tests where appropriate) to examine whether there were any significant differences between males and females. In order to avoid a large number of comparisons, which would increase Type I error, we selectively focused on differences that were particularly
Gender differences
Table 1 presents mean age for female and male patients as well as proportion of level of ID, source of referral and type of residence. There were no statistically significant differences between males and females in terms of mean age (t < 1), level of ID (χ2 (2) = 1.91, p > .10) and source of referral (χ2 < 1). However, there were more females living in a family home and more males living either independently or in a health service residence. There were also significant differences in terms of marital
Discussion
The present investigation is one of the first reported studies on gender differences in co-morbid psychopathology and care pathways in adults with ASD and ID referred to specialist services. In terms of socio-demographic characteristics, although there were no pronounced age and differences in level of ID, females were more likely to be living in a family home, and males more likely to be living either independently or in a health service setting. This pattern may explained by the fact that
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