Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) symptom profiles of children with comorbid Down syndrome (DS) and ASD: A comparison with children with DS-only and ASD-only
Section snippets
What this paper adds?
Few studies have examined the ASD symptom profile of youth with comorbid DS and ASD (DS + ASD). Of the limited research, no studies of DS + ASD examining ASD symptoms have used gold standard diagnostic measures to designate group membership. Consequently, the current study expands upon past research by examining ASD symptoms in children with DS + ASD, DS-only, and ASD-only who were diagnosed through direct assessment using the gold standard Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule and whose ASD
Participants
DS and DS + ASD participants: Participants with DS were a subset of individuals previously enrolled in studies from two universities (for more information, see DiGuiseppi et al., 2010). Participants were eligible if they were born between January 1, 1996 to December 21, 2003 and had a caregiver who spoke English or Spanish fluently. These participants were originally recruited from a statewide registry of birth defects, which included families’ contact information and most recent mailing
Results
A 3 × 2 semi-parametric ANOVA with one between-subjects factor (Diagnostic Group: DS + ASD, DS-only, ASD) and one within-subjects factor (Algorithm domain composite score: SOC-COM, RBI) was conducted to examine differences among the three diagnostic groups on the two ADI-R domains. A main effect of diagnostic group was found (F(2,96) = 60.21, p < 0.01), such that the ASD group had higher scores (indicating greater impairment) than the DS+ASD group who in turn had higher scores than the DS-only
Findings and interpretation
Little is known about the ASD symptom profile of youth with comorbid DS + ASD. The very small existing literature suggests that children with DS + ASD differ from children with DS on autism symptom measures and other aspects of psychosocial functioning, and studies comparing children with DS + ASD to those with ASD have yielded inconsistent findings. Consequently, researchers and clinicians have been unable to draw robust conclusions about shared and unique features of these conditions to
Declarations of interest
None.
Funding
The work was supported by the National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities, Center for Disease Control and Prevention, through Cooperative Agreement RTO12005-1/2–416 with the Association of University Centers on Disabilities, University Center of Excellence in Developmental Disabilities Education, Research, and Service Grant 90DD0632 from the Administration on Developmental Disabilities, Administration for Children and Families; and Leadership Education in Neurodevelopmental
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2020, Progress in Brain ResearchCitation Excerpt :Specifically, individuals with DS compared with typical developing children are especially friendly and highly sociable, but have difficulties in understanding false beliefs and appearance-reality and difficulties with emotional recognition (Hippolyte et al., 2008; Kasari and Freeman, 2001; Kasari et al., 1995; Wishart et al., 2007). Approximately 16% of people suffering from DS also fulfill the criteria for autism spectrum disorder and is characterized by social-communicative impairments and repetitive behaviors and interests (Godfrey et al., 2019). DS population show a link between social cognition and working memory, which explained why there is above 50% of the variability of social cognition in DS participants (Amado et al., 2016).
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