Autism

OBJECTIVES: The study assesses the diagnostic validity of the Scale of Pervasive Developmental Disorder in Mentally Retarded Persons (PDD-MRS). METHODS: Unblinded conduct of PDD-MRS in a clinical psychiatric sample of adults with intellectual disability (ID; N  = 109) and suspect of autism. RESULTS: For a cut-off-score of 10, sensitivity was 89 %, specificity 62 % and the Area Under the Curve (AUC) 0.83. The total score was independent of age, gender and level of ID...

The possibility to generate construct valid animal models enabled the development and testing of therapeutic strategies targeting the core features of autism spectrum disorders (ASDs). At the same time, these studies highlighted the necessity of identifying sensitive developmental time windows for successful therapeutic interventions. Animal and human studies also uncovered the possibility to stratify the variety of ASDs in molecularly distinct subgroups, potentially facilitating effective treatment design...

Prosodic impairments occur in many clinical populations, including those with autism and motor speech disorders. These impairments can negatively impact intelligibility, as well as an individual's ability to signal and understand linguistic contrasts and emotions. For this study, we surveyed 245 Speech-Language Pathologists (SLPs) to assess their clinical practices with regards to prosody and to identify potential barriers to addressing prosody in the clinic. While a majority of respondents agreed that prosody was within their scope of practice, they reported that they rarely assessed or treated prosody when they suspected that a client had a prosodic impairment...

Early gestation is a neurodevelopmental period that is especially vulnerable to environmental insult and one in which neurogenesis features prominently. Prenatal perturbation during early gestation has been linked to neuropsychiatric illnesses such as autism and schizophrenia, and severe environmental insult during this period can result in profound mental impairment. Midbrain dopamine neurons are generated during early gestation and play a key role in the motor, cognitive and reward circuitries implicated in neuropsychiatric disease and addiction...

Objectives Vitamin A is essential for normal cellular physiology and is often taken as a dietary supplement. Hypervitaminosis A can lead to hypercalcemia by increasing osteoclasts and subsequent bone resporption. Dietary supplements including vitamin A are new popular treatment stategies for autism. Case presentation We report a five-year old boy with autism spectrum disorder presenting with severe abdominal pain and bilateral lower extremity pain, who was found to have persistent hypercalcemia due to hypervitaminosis A...

Prior studies have demonstrated that infants and toddlers who later go on to develop autism spectrum disorder (ASD) show atypical functional connectivity as well as altered neural processing of language and other auditory stimuli, but the timeline underlying the emergence of these altered developmental trajectories is still unclear. Here we used resting-state fMRI (rsfMRI) during natural sleep to examine the longitudinal development of functional connectivity in language-related networks from 1.5 to 9 months of age...

Increasing evidence links heterozygosity for NRXN1 gene deletions to a clinically wide spectrum of neurodevelopmental, psychiatric, and neurological disorders. However, to date, the neurocognitive and social communication features of children carrying this genomic rearrangement have not been assessed in detail. The cognitive and behavioral profiles of five children carrying a heterozygous NRXN1 deletion were investigated through systematic assessment of the cognitive and developmental levels, adaptive profile, and presence of behavioral symptoms and autistic features...

The theme of camouflage recently gained unexpected momentum in autism research. Symposia and panel discussions are devoted to ' camouflage' in autism conferences. Because of its association with intended deception, the term camouflage has poor fit with the autism world. However, psychopathologists have a long tradition of resorting to camouflage-like terminology, from Freud's reaction formation, to pseudoschizophrenia, to Winnicott's false self, to masked depression, and even to the recent quasi-autism, artfully telling us that what we see is actually not what we see but rather what we cannot see...

The present study used synchronous video conferencing to remotely deliver a behavioral skills training-based (BST) parent training program to 3 parents of children with autism in the family home. Parents were taught to implement graduated guidance to teach their children several important self-care skills. Parents did not correctly implement graduated guidance after receiving detailed written instructions only. After parents received the BST parent training package, however, all parents implemented graduated guidance with near-perfect levels of fidelity, and all children completed the targeted self-care skills with substantially higher levels of accuracy and independence...

Autism (or autism spectrum disorder [ASD]) is an often disabling childhood neurologic condition of mostly unknown cause. We previously explored whether there was an association of ASD with any analyte measured in the first newborn screening blood test. Here we explore the second screen. Our matched case-control study examined data on 3-5 year-old patients with any ASD diagnosis in the Texas Medicaid system in 2010-2012. Subjects were linked to their 2007-2009 newborn screening blood test data, which included values for 36 analytes or analyte ratios...

BACKGROUND: In Singapore, despite the availability of specialized services and resources in mainstream schools for students with special educational needs, parents can still be hesitant to disclose their child's diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder (ASD), for fear of stigma or negative attitudes from teachers and peers. AIM: This study aims to understand how diagnostic labels affect teachers' perceptions of behaviours in students with ASD in mainstream primary schools, particularly behaviours which are difficult for educators to manage in the classroom setting...

To evaluate an eye tracking task as a predictor and outcome measure of treatment response for autism spectrum disorder (ASD) social skills interventions, adolescents and young adults with ASD completed the eye tracking task before, immediately after, and two months after completing Social Cognition and Interaction Training for Autism (SCIT-A). The study compared SCIT-A participants (n = 20) to participants with ASD who received treatment as usual (TAU; n = 21). Overall, increased visual attention to faces and background objects and decreased attention to hands playing with toys at baseline were associated with improved social functioning immediately following intervention, suggesting this eye tracking task may reliably predict ASD social intervention outcomes...

Emerging quantitative research found self-compassion to be a unique predictor of parental stress in parents of children with ASD above other predictors. However, research on the lived experience of self-compassion in families of children with ASD is limited. Using a qualitative thematic analysis approach, 19 mothers of children with ASD with a mean age of 39.19 years (SD = 3.56, Range = 31.00-50.00 years) were interviewed about their lived experiences of stress and self-compassion. Themes derived from interviews include: the impact and causes of stress, benefits of self-compassion, barriers to self-compassion, and aids to self-compassion...

Substantial research indicates that individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) have difficulties with Theory of Mind (ToM) abilities, but rarely have studies used a comprehensive battery to measure both the cognitive and affective aspects of ToM. The present study tested this ability in 24 Greek-speaking children with ASD (ages 7-14), and their performance was compared to 24 age-, gender- and language-matched typically developing controls. Results showed that ASD children's performance was selectively impaired in both ToM aspects, supporting the distinction between ToM components...

Language development in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) varies greatly among affected individuals and is a strong predictor of later outcomes. Younger siblings of children with ASD have increased risk of ASD, but also language delay. Identifying neural markers of language outcomes in infant siblings could facilitate earlier intervention and improved outcomes. This study aimed to determine whether EEG measures from the first 2-years of life can explain heterogeneity in language development in children at low- and high-risk for ASD, and to determine whether associations between EEG measures and language development are different depending on ASD risk status or later ASD diagnosis...

No abstract text is available yet for this article.

No abstract text is available yet for this article.

Objective : Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) experience significant challenges in executive functioning. Emerging evidence suggests exercise may improve executive functioning among children; however, these effects and their mechanisms have not been fully explored among children with ASD. The purpose of this study was to explore the acute effect of exercise on cerebral oxygenation within the prefrontal cortex and inhibitory control among male children with ASD. Method : Participants ( N = 12) were 8-12 years of age with a diagnosis of ASD...

This study sought to examine the influence of age and sex on morphometric measurements of the corpus callosum (CC) within Middle Eastern Arab population, in order to obtain reference data and conduct racial comparisons with previously reported measurements from other ethnicities. Furthermore, it aimed to investigate CC variations that may occur in children with autism. To this end, magnetic resonance images of normal brains were acquired from three different age groups, consisting of children, younger adults, and older adults...

Kallikrein-related peptidases (KLKs) are a family of serine proteases that when dysregulated may contribute to neuroinflammation and neurodegeneration. In the present review article, we describe what is known about their physiological and pathological roles with an emphasis on KLK6 and KLK8, two KLKs that are highly expressed in the adult central nervous system (CNS). Altered expression and activity of KLK6 have been linked to brain physiology and the development of multiple sclerosis. On the other hand, altered levels of KLK6 in the brain and serum of people affected by Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease have been documented, pointing out to its function in amyloid metabolism and development of synucleinopathies...