1. Bentz M, Pedersen SH, Moslet U. Case series of family-based treatment for restrictive-type eating disorders and comorbid autism: What can we learn? A brief report. Eur Eat Disord Rev;2022 (Jul 8)

OBJECTIVE: Autism is more prevalent among persons with Restrictive type eating disorders (R-ED) compared to the general population and is associated with poorer outcomes across treatment modalities. Knowledge is sparse with regard to whether poorer outcomes are also associated with Family-based treatment (FBT), which is recommended as the first choice of treatment for young persons (YPs) with R-ED. This case series compares outcome between groups with and without autism in a large consecutive series of YPs with R-ED treated with FBT. METHOD: In an earlier described consecutive series of 157 YPs with R-ED treated with FBT, we compared the outcomes of the subgroup with (N = 16) and without (N = 141) comorbid autism. Primary ICD-10 diagnoses were typical (50.0) or atypical anorexia nervosa (AN) (F50.1), the latter implying a condition as typical AN but with a failure to meet one of the diagnostic criteria. Autism diagnoses were clinically assigned. The outcomes were receiving intensified care, weight normalisation and overall successful treatment. RESULTS: 10.2% (N = 16) of the sample had autism. 2.5% (N = 4) had autism diagnosed prior to the Eating Disorder (ED), and an additional 7.7% (N = 12) were diagnosed with autism during ED treatment. Significantly more YPs with autism (50%, N = 8) compared with YPs without autism (16%, N = 23) received intensified care (day programme or inpatient treatment) during their treatment. No significant difference between groups regarding neither weight normalisation nor successful ending of the treatment were found. CONCLUSION: This small sample of YPs with autism suggests that comparable proportions of YPs with and without autism may restore normal weight and end the treatment successfully within 12 months. However, more YPs with comorbid autism needed more intensive treatment, indicating that outpatient treatment delivery may not be sufficient to bring about desired change in this patient group. Findings need confirmation in a larger sample with a systematic screening for autism.

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2. Bouhali R, Al-Tabaa H, Abdelfattah S, Atiyeh M, Esmaeili S, Al-Tabbakh H. Otisma: an integrated application and humanoid robot as an educational tool for children with autism. J Med Eng Technol;2022 (Jul 8):1-10.

Autistic children have difficulty communicating wants, needs, and thoughts. In cases of low functioning autism, an individual can have serious speech and language disabilities. In response to the need of parents and therapists dealing with autistic children, social robots have been developed and incorporated into assisting children with autism. Research studies have proved the possibility of improving autistic children’s lives using social robots. However, not any social robot can successfully fulfil this task, since autistic children are sensitive to certain behaviours, shapes, and colours. The proposed integrated application and humanoid robot, Otisma has been designed and developed after an intensive literature research. Otisma can be used as an educational and communicational tool with autistic children. Otisma aids educators by using applied behaviour analysis (ABA) which is a scientifically validated method that helps autistic children work through areas of severe developmental delay, like language and nonverbal communication. Different lessons can be explored using an application that is controlled by the therapist. Otisma is an efficient educational tool that facilitates the learning process to maximise social skills for children with autism. Otisma is portable, affordable, user friendly, and can be equally used by therapists in clinics or parents at home.

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3. Brewer N, Lucas CA, Georgopoulos MA, Young RL. Facing up to others’ emotions: No evidence of autism-related deficits in metacognitive awareness of emotion recognition. Autism Res;2022 (Jul 7)

Emotion recognition difficulties are considered to contribute to social-communicative problems for autistic individuals and awareness of such difficulties may be critical for the identification and pursuit of strategies that will mitigate their adverse effects. We examined metacognitive awareness of face emotion recognition responses in autistic (N = 63) and non-autistic (N = 67) adults across (a) static, dynamic and social face emotion stimuli, (b) free- and forced-report response formats, and (c) four different sets of the six « basic » and six « complex » emotions. Within-individual relationships between recognition accuracy and post-recognition confidence provided no indication that autistic individuals were poorer at discriminating correct from incorrect recognition responses than non-autistic individuals, although both groups exhibited marked inter-individual variability. Although the autistic group was less accurate and slower to recognize emotions, confidence-accuracy calibration analyses provided no evidence of reduced sensitivity on their part to fluctuations in their emotion recognition performance. Across variations in stimulus type, response format and emotion, increases in accuracy were associated with progressively higher confidence, with similar calibration curves for both groups. Calibration curves for both groups were, however, characterized by overconfidence at the higher confidence levels (i.e., overall accuracy less than the average confidence level), with the non-autistic group contributing more decisions with 90%-100% confidence. Comparisons of slow and fast responders provided no evidence of a « hard-easy » effect-the tendency to exhibit overconfidence during hard tasks and underconfidence during easy tasks-suggesting that autistic individuals’ slower recognition responding may reflect a strategic difference rather than a processing speed limitation. LAY SUMMARY: It is generally considered that autistic individuals may have difficulty recognizing other people’s facial emotions. However, little is known about their awareness of any emotion recognition difficulties they may experience. This study indicates that, although there is considerable individual variability, autistic adults were as sensitive to variations in the accuracy of their recognition of others’ emotions as their non-autistic peers.

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4. Capp SJ, Agnew-Blais J, Lau-Zhu A, Colvert E, Tye C, Aydin Ü, Lautarescu A, Ellis C, Saunders T, O’Brien L, Ronald A, Happé F, McLoughlin G. Is quality of life related to high autistic traits, high ADHD traits and their Interaction? Evidence from a Young-Adult Community-Based twin sample. J Autism Dev Disord;2022 (Jul 8)

This study explored whether high autistic traits, high attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) traits and their interaction were associated with quality of life (QoL) in a sample of 556 of young-adult twins (Mean age 22 years 5 months, 52% Female). Four participant groups were created: high autistic traits, high ADHD traits, high autistic/ADHD traits, and low ADHD/autistic traits. High autistic traits were associated with lower QoL across domains (physical, psychological, social, and environmental). High ADHD traits associated with lower physical, psychological, and environmental QoL. The interaction of autistic and ADHD traits was not significant in any domain. While mental health difficulties were associated with lower QoL, after accounting for mental health, most relationships between autistic traits, ADHD traits and QoL remained.

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5. Carpenter KL, Williams DM. A meta-analysis and critical review of metacognitive accuracy in autism. Autism;2022 (Jul 7):13623613221106004.

The ability to make accurate judgements about our own and others’ mental states has been widely researched; however, it is unclear how these two abilities relate to each other. This is important given that there is evidence that autistic individuals can have difficulty with accurately judging others’ mental states. Recent evidence suggests that some autistic individuals may also have difficulty accurately judging their own mental states. This may have an impact on various aspects of everyday life but particularly academic success, and therefore it is important that this skill is not overlooked when exploring areas of individual support. The aim of this article is to bring together the research examining autistic individual’s ability of making accurate judgements about their own mental states and to establish whether this is an area that warrants further investigation. The results from this article show that autistic individuals may have difficulty making accurate judgements about their own mental states, although this depends on the type of judgement being made. It also highlighted that while autistic children may have difficulties in some areas, these may improve by adulthood. Overall, this article shows that more research is needed to fully understand where specific difficulties lie and how they may be overcome.

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6. DeLucia EA, McFayden TC, Fok M, Andrzejewski TM, Scarpa A, McDonnell CG. Frequency and correlates of augmentative and alternative communication use in an autistic inpatient sample. J Autism Dev Disord;2022 (Jul 7)

Although augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) strategies are often used by autistic youth, little is known about the use of AAC in inpatient psychiatric settings. This study evaluated how demographic and clinical factors (e.g., language level, IQ) related to AAC use in a well-characterized sample of 527 autistic youth (78.7% male, mean age 12.94) who participated in the Autism Inpatient Collection. AAC use was common, with 42.5% of caregivers reporting at least one form of AAC. White children were more likely to use AAC than non-white children at the bivariate level. In regression analyses, young children were more likely to use AAC than older children. These results suggest the importance of provider training and improved equitable access to AAC.

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7. Falter-Wagner CM, Bloch C, Burghof L, Lehnhardt FG, Vogeley K. Autism traits outweigh alexithymia traits in the explanation of mentalising performance in adults with autism but not in adults with rejected autism diagnosis. Mol Autism;2022 (Jul 8);13(1):32.

BACKGROUND: Pronounced alexithymia traits have been found in autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and recent research has been carving out the impact alexithymia traits might have on mentalising deficits associated with ASD. METHOD: In this cross-sectional study, a large representative referral population for diagnostic examination for possible ASD (n = 400) was screened for clinical alexithymia with a German version of the Reading the Mind in the Eyes test (RME). In contrast to previous attempts to carve out the impact of alexithymia traits on mentalising deficits though, we employed dominance analysis to account for the correlation between predictors. The relative relationship between alexithymia traits and autism traits with RME performance was investigated in the group of individuals with confirmed ASD diagnosis (N = 281) and compared to the clinical referral sample in which ASD was ruled out (N = 119). RESULTS: Dominance analysis revealed autism traits to be the strongest predictor for reduced mentalising skills in the ASD sample, whereas alexithymia contributed significantly less. In the sample of individuals with ruled out diagnosis, autism traits were the strongest predictor, but alexithymia traits were in sum equally associated to mentalising, with the External-Oriented Thinking subscale as an important predictor of this association. LIMITATIONS: It needs to be considered that the cross-sectional study design does not allow for causal inference. Furthermore, mentalising is a highly facetted capacity and measurements need to reduce this complexity into simple quantities which limits the generalizability of results. DISCUSSION: While alexithymia traits should be considered for their mental health importance, they do not dominate the explanation of reduced mentalising skills in individuals with ASD, but they might do to a larger degree in individuals with ruled out ASD.

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8. Giannotti M, Bentenuto A, Venuti P, de Falco S. Explicit and implicit attachment representations in cognitively able school-age children with autism spectrum disorder: A window to their inner world. Clin Child Psychol Psychiatry;2022 (Jul 6):13591045221113390.

The few studies available on quality of attachment in school-age children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) exclusively used questionnaires assessing explicit attachment representations. Thus, in the current study we assessed both explicit and implicit attachment representations in 23 children with ASD (without intellectual disability), 22 with learning disabilities and 27 with typical development aged from 7 to 13 years. A self-reported measure on the quality of attachment to parents and a semi-structured interview were administered to the children. In addition, a developmental assessment of the child including measures of intelligence and social-communication impairment was conducted. Despite the lack of group differences on explicit attachment representations, we found that children with ASD showed higher rates of at-risk self-protective strategies and psychological trauma compared to the TD group. Children with SLD also showed a high level of at-risk implicit attachment representations than TD, albeit to a lesser extent compared to children with ASD. These results may be related to several factors associated with ASD impairment and developmental pathways, such as the atypical learning process which occur at interpersonal level, the difficulties in social information processing and reflective functioning. Our findings suggested that children with ASD may experience difficulties in the construction of balanced implicit attachment representations. Thus, a more comprehensive assessment of attachment including both implicit and explicit representations is recommended.

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9. Gozes I. From the Desk of the Editor‑in‑Chief: Excerpts from the Society for Neurochemistry (ESN) Future Perspectives for European Neurochemistry Highlighting the Symposium Asking « Autism, Epilepsy, Intellectual Disability Where Do These All Meet? ». J Mol Neurosci;2022 (Jul 7)

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10. Guo M, Xie P, Liu S, Luan G, Li T. Epilepsy and Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD): The underlying Mechanisms and Therapy Targets related with Adenosine. Curr Neuropharmacol;2022 (Jul 6)

Epilepsy and autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are highly mutually comorbid, suggesting potential overlaps in genetic etiology, pathophysiology, and neurodevelopmental abnormalities. Adenosine, an endogenous anticonvulsant and neuroprotective neuromodulator of the brain, has been proved to affect the process of epilepsy and ASD. On the one hand, adenosine plays a crucial role in preventing the progression and development of epilepsy through adenosine receptor-dependent and -independent ways. On the other hand, adenosine signaling can not only regulate core symptoms but also improve comorbid disorders in ASD. Given the important role of adenosine in epilepsy and ASD together, therapeutic strategies related to adenosine, including the ketogenic diet, neuro-modulation therapy, and adenosine augmentation therapy, have been suggested for the arrangement of epilepsy and ASD. There are several proposals in this review. Firstly, based on the comorbid symptoms and mechanisms of epilepsy and ASD, to further discuss the relationship between both diseases. Secondly, to explore the role of adenosine involved in epilepsy and ASD. Lastly, to emphasize the potential therapeutic value and clinical approaches of adenosine-related therapies in treating epilepsy and ASD.

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11. Hadad BS, Yashar A. Sensory Perception in Autism: What Can We Learn?. Annu Rev Vis Sci;2022 (Jul 8)

Autism is a neurodevelopmental disorder of unknown etiology. Recently, there has been a growing interest in sensory processing in autism as a core phenotype. However, basic questions remain unanswered. Here, we review the major findings and models of perception in autism and point to methodological issues that have led to conflicting results. We show that popular models of perception in autism, such as the reduced prior hypothesis, cannot explain the many and varied findings. To resolve these issues, we point to the benefits of using rigorous psychophysical methods to study perception in autism. We advocate for perceptual models that provide a detailed explanation of behavior while also taking into account factors such as context, learning, and attention. Furthermore, we demonstrate the importance of tracking changes over the course of development to reveal the causal pathways and compensatory mechanisms. Finally, we propose a developmental perceptual narrowing account of the condition. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Vision Science, Volume 8 is September 2022. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.

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12. Hadders-Algra M. Emerging signs of autism spectrum disorder in infancy: Putative neural substrate. Dev Med Child Neurol;2022 (Jul 8)

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is characterized by altered development of the social brain with prominent atypical features in the fronto-temporo-parietal cortex and cerebellum. Early signs of ASD emerge between 6 and 12 months: reduced social communication, slightly less advanced motor development, and repetitive behaviour. The fronto-temporo-parietal cortex and cerebellum play a prominent role in the development of social communication, whereas fronto-parietal-cerebellar networks are involved in the planning of movements, that is, movement selection. Atypical sensory responsivity, a core feature of ASD, may result in impaired development of social communication and motor skills and/or selection of atypical repetitive behaviour. In the first postnatal year, the brain areas involved are characterized by gradual dissolution of temporary structures: the fronto-temporo-parietal cortical subplate and cerebellar external granular layer. It is hypothesized that altered dissolution of the transient structures opens the window for the expression of early signs of ASD arising in the impaired developing permanent networks.

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13. Han Y, Rizzo DM, Hanley JP, Coderre EL, Prelock PA. Identifying neuroanatomical and behavioral features for autism spectrum disorder diagnosis in children using machine learning. PLoS One;2022;17(7):e0269773.

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder that can cause significant social, communication, and behavioral challenges. Diagnosis of ASD is complicated and there is an urgent need to identify ASD-associated biomarkers and features to help automate diagnostics and develop predictive ASD models. The present study adopts a novel evolutionary algorithm, the conjunctive clause evolutionary algorithm (CCEA), to select features most significant for distinguishing individuals with and without ASD, and is able to accommodate datasets having a small number of samples with a large number of feature measurements. The dataset is unique and comprises both behavioral and neuroimaging measurements from a total of 28 children from 7 to 14 years old. Potential biomarker candidates identified include brain volume, area, cortical thickness, and mean curvature in specific regions around the cingulate cortex, frontal cortex, and temporal-parietal junction, as well as behavioral features associated with theory of mind. A separate machine learning classifier (i.e., k-nearest neighbors algorithm) was used to validate the CCEA feature selection and for ASD prediction. Study findings demonstrate how machine learning tools might help move the needle on improving diagnostic and predictive models of ASD.

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14. McLeod JD, Anderson EM. Autistic Traits and College Adjustment. J Autism Dev Disord;2022 (Jul 7)

This study evaluated the association of autistic traits (RAADS-14) with academic and social outcomes among college students using data from an online survey (N = 2,736). In the academic domain, the total trait score and all subscale scores (mentalizing deficits, social anxiety, sensory reactivity) were associated with course failure and academic difficulties independent of an autism diagnosis; the total score and mentalizing deficits also predicted lower grade point average (GPA). In the social domain, the total trait score and subscale scores were associated with lower odds of having a confidant, lower friendship quality, and higher odds of social exclusion. Subgroup analyses revealed that autistic traits had more consistently negative associations with social outcomes for students without an autism diagnosis than for students with a diagnosis. Associations were also more often significant for women than men. These results support the development of programs and services for students with autistic traits regardless of diagnostic status.

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15. Menashe I, Regev O, Hadar A, Meiri G, Michaelovski A, Dinstein I, Hershkovitz R. Reply: Methodological drawbacks in the alleged association between foetal sonographic anomalies and autism. Brain;2022 (Jul 8)

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16. Nishigori T, Hashimoto K, Mori M, Suzuki T, Watanabe M, Imaizumi K, Murata T, Kyozuka H, Ogata Y, Sato A, Shinoki K, Yasumura S, Fujimori K, Nishigori H, Hosoya M. Association between maternal prenatal psychological distress and autism spectrum disorder among 3-year-old children: The Japan Environment and Children’s Study. J Dev Orig Health Dis;2022 (Jul 8):1-7.

Maternal prenatal psychological distress, which includes depression and anxiety, affects the onset of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). However, there is no consistent knowledge regarding at which term during pregnancy psychological distress affects the risk of ASD among children. We used a dataset obtained from the Japan Environment and Children’s Study, which is a nationwide prospective birth cohort study, to evaluate the association between the six-item Kessler Psychological Distress Scale (K6) and ASD among 3-year-old children. A total of 78,745 children were analyzed, and 355 of them were diagnosed with ASD (0.45%). The maternal K6 was administered twice during pregnancy: at a median of 15.1 weeks (M-T1) and at that of 27.4 weeks (M-T2) of gestation. Multivariate logistic regression analyses demonstrated that the group with a maternal K6 score of ≥5 at both M-T1 and M-T2 was significantly associated with ASD among the children (adjusted odds ratio, 1.440; 95% confidence interval, 1.104-1.877) compared to the group with a score of ≤4 at both M-T1 and M-T2. There was no significant difference between the group with a score of ≥5 only at M-T1 or M-T2 and that with a score of ≤4 at both M-T1 and M-T2. In conclusion, from the first to the second half of pregnancy, continuous maternal psychological distress was associated with ASD among 3-year-old children. Contrarily, in the group without persistent maternal psychological distress during pregnancy, there was no significant association.

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17. Nugent M, Ward J. Familial aggregation of synaesthesia with autism (but not schizophrenia). Cogn Neuropsychiatry;2022 (Jul 7):1-19.

INTRODUCTION: This study determines whether there is a familial aggregation between synaesthesia and two neuropsychiatric conditions (autism and schizophrenia). METHOD We examined the prevalence of autism and schizophrenia among synaesthetes and non-synaesthetic controls, and among their first-degree relatives. RESULTS: As predicted, autism occurred at elevated levels among synaesthetes and-we document for the first time-amongst their relatives. This was not found for schizophrenia, where a link may be expected, or in a control condition (type 1 diabetes) where we had no a priori reason to assume a link. Synaesthetes, compared to controls, were also more likely to have other synaesthetes in their family. People with three or more types of synaesthesia were more likely (compared to synaesthetes with fewer types) to have synaesthetic relatives and to report autism in themselves. People with two or more types of synaesthesia (compared to synaesthetes with only one type) were more likely to report familial autism. CONCLUSIONS: The results suggest a shared genetic predisposition between synaesthesia and autism, and more extreme synaesthetes may tend to hail from more neurodiverse families.

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18. Patel SP, Cole J, Lau JCY, Fragnito G, Losh M. Verbal entrainment in autism spectrum disorder and first-degree relatives. Sci Rep;2022 (Jul 7);12(1):11496.

Entrainment, the unconscious process leading to coordination between communication partners, is an important dynamic human behavior that helps us connect with one another. Difficulty developing and sustaining social connections is a hallmark of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Subtle differences in social behaviors have also been noted in first-degree relatives of autistic individuals and may express underlying genetic liability to ASD. In-depth examination of verbal entrainment was conducted to examine disruptions to entrainment as a contributing factor to the language phenotype in ASD. Results revealed distinct patterns of prosodic and lexical entrainment in individuals with ASD. Notably, subtler entrainment differences in prosodic and syntactic entrainment were identified in parents of autistic individuals. Findings point towards entrainment, particularly prosodic entrainment, as a key process linked to social communication difficulties in ASD and reflective of genetic liability to ASD.

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19. Perez-Fernandez C, Matamala Montoya M, Morales-Navas M, Guardia-Escote L, Cabré M, Colomina MT, Giménez E, Sánchez-Santed F. Influence of Gestational Chlorpyrifos Exposure on ASD-like Behaviors in an fmr1-KO Rat Model. Mol Neurobiol;2022 (Jul 8)

Based on previous reports, exposure to pesticides could be linked to the prevalence increase of autism spectrum disorders (ASD). Gestational exposure to chlorpyrifos (CPF) has been associated with ASD diagnosis in humans and ASD-like behaviors in rodents. However, ASD severity degree results from the complex relationship between genetic background and environmental factors. Thus, animals with a genetic vulnerability and prenatally exposed to CPF could have a more severe ASD-like phenotype. Fragile X syndrome is one of the most common monogenic causes of ASD, characterized by a mutation in the X chromosome which alters the expression of the fragile X mental retardation protein (FMRP). Based on this, some fmr1 knockout (KO) rodent models have been developed to study the physiological and genetic basis of ASD. Both fmr1-KO and wild-type male rats (F2 generation) were used in the present study. F1 pregnant females were randomly exposed to 1 mg/kg/mL/day of CPF (s.c.) from GD12.5-15.5 or vehicle. Different behavioral, developmental, and molecular variables were analyzed in F2 males. KO rats were heavier, emitted altered USVs, were socially inefficient, reacted more to a novel stimulus, were hyperactive when exploring a new context, but hypoactive when exploring anxiety-inducing environments, and had an upregulated hippocampal expression of the grin2c gene. When exposed to low doses of CPF during gestation, these KO rats showed decreased climbing capacity, dysfunctional social interaction, and increased hippocampal expression for kcc1 and 5ht2c genes. Gestational CPF exposure increased the ASD-like phenotype in those animals with a genetic vulnerability, although its effect was less generalized than expected. It is the first time that this additive effect of CPF exposure and the fmr1-KO genetic vulnerability model is explored concerning social traits or any other behavior.

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20. Rollins PR, De Froy AM, Gajardo SA, Brantley S. Pragmatic contributions to early vocabulary and social communication in young autistic children with language and cognitive delays. J Commun Disord;2022 (Jun 22);99:106243.

INTRODUCTION: There are limited data on the interrelationships among pragmatic skills and expressive vocabulary and their contribution to later social communication. Understanding these relationships could inform developmental processes and early intervention strategies. This study explored the relationship among pragmatics skills (i.e., communicative intents and responding to parents’ preceding utterances) and concurrent expressive vocabulary as well as the predictive nature of these skills on later social communication in young autistic children with language and cognitive delays. METHOD: Data from 56 autistic children (age 18-57 months) who participated in a larger randomized control trial of Pathways Early Autism Intervention were used in this secondary analysis. Video recordings of pre-intervention (Time 1) parent-child interactions were analyzed for number of different words (NDW; expressive vocabulary), number of different (ND) communicative intents, and response to parents’ preceding utterances. Residual scores from an assessment of social communication were used to measure Time 2 social communication. First-order correlations and hierarchical regression were used for analyses. RESULTS: Adjusting for age and receptive language, both ND communicative intents and response to parents’ preceding utterances were associated with pre-intervention NDW. Further, adjusting for receptive language age and intervention group, NDW and response to parents’ preceding utterances – but not ND communicative intents-was related to Time 2 social communication. NDW, however, was no longer related to Time 2 social communication skills after accounting for response to parents’ preceding utterances. CONCLUSIONS: This study provides evidence that autistic children with language and cognitive delays use their expressive vocabularies to respond, hence allocating attention to parent speech, a rudimentary form of social orienting. Our results support approaches to intervention that leverage responding as a rudimentary form of social orienting while encouraging more mature forms of social attention (i.e., social orienting to faces and joint attention) within developmentally appropriate activities, such as routines.

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21. Sagi-Dain L, Weisz B, Krajden KH, Singer A, Yaron Y, Maymon R. Methodological drawbacks in the alleged association between foetal sonographic anomalies and autism. Brain;2022 (Jul 8)

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22. Salari N, Rasoulpoor S, Shohaimi S, Jafarpour S, Abdoli N, Khaledi-Paveh B, Mohammadi M. The global prevalence of autism spectrum disorder: a comprehensive systematic review and meta-analysis. Ital J Pediatr;2022 (Jul 8);48(1):112.

BACKGROUND: Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is one of the serious developmental disorders that is usually diagnosed below the age of three years. Although the severity of the disease’s symptoms varies from patient to patient, the ability to communicate with others is affected in all forms of ASD. This study aimed to determine the prevalence of ASD in high-risk groups by continent. METHODS: The present study was conducted by systematic review and meta-analysis from 2008 to July 2021. Databases such as Science Direct, PubMed, Scopus, SID, Magiran, Web of Science (WoS), and Google Scholar from 2008 to July 2021 were searched to find related studies. Data were analysed using Comprehensive Meta-Analysis software (Version 2). RESULTS: A total of 74 studies with 30,212,757 participants were included in this study. The prevalence of ASD in the world was 0.6% (95% confidence interval: 0.4-1%). Subgroup analyses indicated that the prevalence of ASD in Asia, America, Europe, Africa and Australia was 0.4% (95% CI: 0.1-1), 1% (95% CI: 0.8-1.1), 0.5% (95% CI: 0.2-1), 1% (95% CI: 0.3-3.1), 1.7% (95% CI: 0.5-6.1) respectively. CONCLUSION: ASD imposes a heavy health burden on communities around the world. Early detection of ASD can reduce the incidence of developmental disorders and improve patients’ communication skills. Therefore, health policymakers need to be aware of the prevalence and increasing trend of ASD to implement appropriate planning and interventions to reduce its consequences.

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23. Scott M, Leppanen J, Allen M, Jarrold C, Sedgewick F. Longitudinal Analysis of Mental Health in Autistic University Students Across an Academic Year. J Autism Dev Disord;2022 (Jul 8):1-10.

BACKGROUND: Autistic people have worse mental health (MH) than non-autistic people. This proof-of-concept study explored feasibility of longitudinal research with autistic university students, focusing on their MH and coping styles across an academic year. METHODS: Twenty-two students took part at all timepoints. They completed four rounds of online MH questionnaires. RESULTS: Over 80% of students were retained. They started the year with high levels of all MH issues, which remained stable across the year. Network Change analysis showed the connections between MH and coping style changed over time. CONCLUSIONS: Autistic students are engaged participants who are likely to take part in longitudinal research. While MH levels were stable, it may be that coping styles are a useful target for intervention.

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24. Webster A, Bruck S, Saggers B. Supporting self-determination of autistic students in transitions. Res Dev Disabil;2022 (Jul 4);128:104301.

BACKGROUND: Despite awareness of the need to support autistic students in transitions, great variability is found in transition supports provided across different school environments and staff within schools. Moreover, strategies implemented may not provide autistic students with the supports they need to reduce their anxiety and build their sense of self-determination during transitions. AIM: The current paper aimed to determine what types of transition supports are employed in Australian schools to support autistic students and to consider these supports through the lens of self-determination theory. METHODS: Surveys were conducted with 422 parents, educators and education specialists who provided information on transition supports employed in schools in open-ended questions. Transition supports were explored in more depth through interviews with a subset of 30 participants. RESULTS: Findings indicate that schools provided a range of strategies, programmes and planning processes to support students in transitions. However, students were often passive recipients of supports who were rarely involved in the planning and implementation of strategies. CONCLUSION: The results of this study suggest that current transition supports implemented in schools may support autistic students in some transitions, but are not likely to develop their self-determination to successfully navigate transitions over the long-term. WHAT THIS PAPER ADDS?: Drawing on self-determination theory, this study provides a unique and much needed examination of the types of strategies employed in schools and offers a critical reflection as to whether these strategies are likely to support autistic students to develop a sense of autonomy, competence and relatedness to successfully manage future transitions.

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25. Zukerman G, Yahav G, Ben-Itzchak E. Adaptive behavior and psychiatric symptoms in university students with ASD: One-year longitudinal study. Psychiatry Res;2022 (Jul 1);315:114701.

In recent years, more young adults with ASD are attending post-secondary education, and several support programs have been proposed for this population. However, research regarding the long-term effects of university enrollment on outcomes among students with ASD is scarce. This study examined adaptive behavior and psychiatric symptoms during the first semester of two consecutive academic years (T1, T2) among 39 students with ASD, 29 students without ASD and high levels of social anxiety symptoms (High SA), and 32 students without ASD and low levels of SA symptoms (Low SA). Students with ASD participated in a university support program and resided with a peer mentor student without ASD, which encouraged social interaction. At T1, students with ASD reported lower levels of adaptive behavior and higher levels of social anxiety and obsessive-compulsive symptoms compared to the other groups. However, at follow-up (T2), significantly higher conceptual adaptive skill levels (specifically communication skills) and significantly lower depression symptom levels from T1 were reported only among students with ASD. The levels of social anxiety and obsessive-compulsive symptoms at T1 were negatively associated with adaptive functioning a year later (T2). Implications regarding adults with ASD attending university are discussed.

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