Autism Exam Flashcards
5 diagnostic criteria per DSM-5
- Deficits in social communication and interaction
- Restricted, repetitive behaviors or interests
- Symptoms present during the early developmental period
- Symptoms cause clinically significant impairment
- Not better explained by intellectual disability or global developmental delay
Social/communication deficit examples
- Deficits in social-emotional reciprocity
- Abnormalities in eye contact/body language, lack of gestures/nonverbal communication
- Language deficits/delays
- Difficultly developing or maintaining relationships
- Difficultly with imaginative play
- Lack of pointing, showing, or bringing object of interest to others
- Joint attention deficits
RRB examples
- Repetitive motor behaviors
- Fixated interests
- Insistence on sameness/routine
- Under- or over-reactivity to sensory input
3 severity levels
Requiring support, requiring substantial support, requiring very substantial support
What percentage of indiv. with ASD are diagnosed with a comorbid mental disorder
70%
ASD is approx. how many times more likely to occur in males than in females
3-4
Prevalence estimate
0.74% or about 1 in every 125
What is a prognostic factor
Predictor of outcome for an individual
Best prognostic factors for ASD are
Language delay and intellectual disability
Environmental risk factors
- Older parents
- Low birth weight
- Fetal exposure to toxins
Functional consequences of ASD
- Difficulties with academic achievement
- Difficulty establishing independence
- Social isolation
ASD is what type of disorder
Neurobiological
Possible benefits of identifying earliest signs of ASD
- Careful study of processes that may be affected by atypical developmental trajectory
- Insights into biological mechanisms of typical social development
- Earlier identification, screening, and intervention
- Possible prevention of full syndrome
Early biological markers of ASD include
- Larger head circumference
- Abnormal/enlarged cerebral white and gray matter
Early behavioral markers of ASD include
- Unusual visual inspection of stimuli
- Repetitive hand and finger mannerisms
- Lack of social responsiveness
- Delayed communication
- Temperament and regulatory difficulties
Retrospective studies
Conducted after the events of interest have occurred (parent report, home videos)
Prospective studies
Conducted by starting with two groups at the current point, and following up in the future for occurrence
Symptoms seen in infant sibs of children with ASD
- Less likely to respond to their name
- Initiated fewer behavioral requests
- Displayed fewer gazes to faces
- Less likely to initiate or respond to acts of joint attention
- Fixation on objects
- More severe reactions to distress
- More time spent looking at non-social objects
Other notable symptoms
- Smaller vocabulary
- Limited concern for others’ distress
- Rotate and spin objects
- Difficulty with transitions
- Poor motor imitation skills
Limitations of HR infant sib studies
- Variability in data
- Stressors (such as growing up with a sibling with autism) may affect development
- HR sibs with a greater genetic probability of developing ASD may be different than those who do not have this genetic loading
Which appears first, social deficits or communication deficits
Social deficits
Asperger syndrome
ASD symptoms occur without a clinically significant delay in language or in the development of cognitive ability or adaptive behaviors/self-help skills
Diagnostic substitution
one label for a condition (autistic disorder) becomes replaced with another (ASDs), causing an apparent decrease in the rate of the first condition and increase in the rate of the second
Reasons for detected “increase” in prevalence of ASD
- Increased awareness
- Diagnostic substitution
- Changes in diagnostic criteria
- Access to services
- Improved quality & quantity of records
Who first discovered autism
Leo Kanner, 1940s
Adaptive behaviors
the collection of conceptual, social, and practical skills that people learn in order to function in their daily lives
ASD diagnoses are made based on
Behavioral observations and developmental/family history
