1. Bouw N, Swaab H, Tartaglia N, Cordeiro L, van Rijn S. Early Social Behavior in Young Children with Sex Chromosome Trisomies (XXX, XXY, XYY): Profiles of Observed Social Interactions and Social Impairments Associated with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). J Autism Dev Disord;2022 (May 12)

Individuals with Sex Chromosome Trisomies (SCT; XXX, XXY, XYY) have an increased vulnerability for developing challenges in social adaptive functioning. The present study investigates social interaction behavior in the context of varying social load, and Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) symptomatology in young children aged 1-7.5 years old, with SCT (N = 105) and control children (N = 101). Children with SCT show less interaction behaviors and more social withdrawal, as compared to their control peers, which were most evident in the high social load condition. Second, social impairments related to ASD are more prevalent, as compared to controls (27.1% at clinical level). These findings stress the importance of early monitoring and (preventive) support of early social development in young children with SCT.

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2. Hong SJ, Mottron L, Park BY, Benkarim O, Valk SL, Paquola C, Larivière S, Vos de Wael R, Degré-Pelletier J, Soulieres I, Ramphal B, Margolis A, Milham M, Di Martino A, Bernhardt BC. A convergent structure-function substrate of cognitive imbalances in autism. Cereb Cortex;2022 (May 12)

BACKGROUND: Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a common neurodevelopmental diagnosis showing substantial phenotypic heterogeneity. A leading example can be found in verbal and nonverbal cognitive skills, which vary from elevated to impaired compared with neurotypical individuals. Moreover, deficits in verbal profiles often coexist with normal or superior performance in the nonverbal domain. METHODS: To study brain substrates underlying cognitive imbalance in ASD, we capitalized categorical and dimensional IQ profiling as well as multimodal neuroimaging. RESULTS: IQ analyses revealed a marked verbal to nonverbal IQ imbalance in ASD across 2 datasets (Dataset-1: 155 ASD, 151 controls; Dataset-2: 270 ASD, 490 controls). Neuroimaging analysis in Dataset-1 revealed a structure-function substrate of cognitive imbalance, characterized by atypical cortical thickening and altered functional integration of language networks alongside sensory and higher cognitive areas. CONCLUSION: Although verbal and nonverbal intelligence have been considered as specifiers unrelated to autism diagnosis, our results indicate that intelligence disparities are accentuated in ASD and reflected by a consistent structure-function substrate affecting multiple brain networks. Our findings motivate the incorporation of cognitive imbalances in future autism research, which may help to parse the phenotypic heterogeneity and inform intervention-oriented subtyping in ASD.

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3. Lassen J, Oranje B, Vestergaard M, Foldager M, Kjaer TW, Arnfred S, Aggernaes B. Reduced mismatch negativity in children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorder is associated with their impaired adaptive functioning. Autism Res;2022 (May 12)

Children and adolescents on the autism spectrum display sensory disturbances, rigid and repetitive behavior, social communication problems and a high prevalence of impaired adaptive functioning. Autism is associated with slowed behavioral and neural habituation to repeated sensory input and decreased responses to sensory deviations. Mismatch negativity (MMN) reflects a pre-attentive difference in the neural response to sensory deviations relative to regularities and studies overall suggest that children and adolescents with autism tend to have smaller MMN. However, it remains unclear whether reduced MMN in autism is coupled to severity of specific autistic symptoms or more generally to lower level of adaptive functioning. To address these questions, the present study used electroencephalography (EEG) to assess whether auditory MMN in 59 children and adolescents with autism aged 7-14 years compared to 59 typically developing children and adolescents were related to specific autistic symptoms or level in adaptive functioning. As hypothesized, the autism group had a lower MMN amplitude than controls. Smaller MMN amplitudes were specifically associated with lower adaptive functioning in the autistic subjects but not in controls while no apparent relationships were observed with autistic-like social interaction and communication problems, atypical language, rigidity, stereotypy or sensory sensitivity symptoms. Our findings indicate that a blunted response to changes in sensory input may underlie or contribute to the generalized difficulties with adapting to daily life circumstances seen in children and adolescents with autism. LAY SUMMARY: Children and adolescents on the autism spectrum have a high prevalence of impaired adaptive functioning. Neuroimaging studies have reported that children and adolescents with autism display attenuated brain activity when discriminating sensory input. However, it is unknown whether this attenuation is related to autistic symptoms and/or adaptive functioning. The present study used electroencephalogram (EEG) to show that attenuated brain response in discrimination of novel compared to repetitive sounds in children and adolescents with autism is related to their impaired adaptive functioning.

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4. Piaton S, Roger-Leroi V, Vallet GT. Specific form of ageism in dental care: Convergent validity of the Ageism Scale for Dental Students (ASDS) and its implications for education. Eur J Dent Educ;2022 (May 11)

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: The World Health Organization considers ageism as an important barrier to age-appropriate care for older adults. An Ageism Scale for Dental Students (ASDS) has been validated in the United States, Brazil, Greece, Romania and in France. At present, the convergent validity of ASDS has never been evaluated. Moreover, a specialized and disciplinary tool as the ASDS may not overlap with more general ageism assessment which may highlight the need for specific courses during the education of the future health professionals. METHOD: The survey was administered from December 2020 to January 2021. All the undergraduate students of the last three years of study at the dental school of Clermont-Ferrand were invited to complete both scales. 216 students were randomly divided into two equal groups. The first group answered first Ageing Semantic Differential- ASD then ASDS, the second in reverse order. The convergent validity between ASDS and ASD was assessed by computing a Pearson correlation coefficient and discriminant analysis between each component of the two scales. RESULTS: The response rate was of 53.7%. The correlation analysis conducted on the total scores of the ASDS and of the ASD shows a significant, yet weak relationship. The discriminant analysis indicates that only the first component of the ASDS is significantly associated with each dimension of the ASD, whereas the second component is totally independent from the ASD and the third component almost independent from the ASD, except for the integrity dimension. CONCLUSIONS: This specialized questionnaire may assess a form of ageism that is not captured at all in more general scales. Such a scale may help to identify the different dimensions of ageism among dental students which is required to reduce ageism in medical care. This reduction should pass by adapted courses in gerodontology.

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5. Singha SP, Memon S, Bano U, Isaac AD, Shahani MY. Evaluation of p21 expression and related autism-like behavior in Bisphenol-A exposed offspring of Wistar albino rats. Birth Defects Res;2022 (May 12)

BACKGROUND: Bisphenol A (BPA), an endocrine disruptor, may be involved in the etiology of autism spectrum disorders (ASD); however, the mechanism of neuronal and astrocytic damage remains ambiguous. A possible role of altered expression of p21 in autistic-like behavior in rat offspring was examined with prenatal and postnatal BPA exposure. METHODS: Wistar albino dams were exposed to BPA (5 mg/kg) intraperitoneally throughout pregnancy and until the third postnatal day (PND). Pups were examined on 21st PND for behavioral test. Blood samples were collected for serum lactate levels and pups were sacrificed. Right frontal cortices were dissected out and processed for H&E, immunohistochemical analysis, and gene expression. RESULTS: Anxiety like behavior and thigmotaxis along with reduction in serum lactate concentrations were observed in pups exposed to BPA. Decline in neuronal number and decreased astrocytic population with reduced dendritic spines were revealed by H&E and immunohistochemical analysis, respectively, in right frontal cortices. Over expression of p21 was also detected in BPA-exposed offspring. CONCLUSIONS: Over expression of p21 may be associated with autistic behavior. Further studies are recommended to explore the structural alterations in other white matter pathways in frontal cortices.

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6. Wawer A, Chojnicka I. Detecting autism from picture book narratives using deep neural utterance embeddings. Int J Lang Commun Disord;2022 (May 12)

BACKGROUND: Deficits in the ability to use language in social contexts, including storytelling skills, are observed across the autism spectrum. Development in machine-learning approaches may contribute to clinical psychology and psychiatry, given its potential to support decisions concerning the diagnosis and treatment of psychiatric conditions and disorders. AIMS: To evaluate the usefulness of deep neural networks for detecting autism spectrum disorder (ASD) from textual utterances, specifically from narrations produced by individuals with ASD. METHODS & PROCEDURES: We examined two text encoders: Embeddings from Language Models (ELMo) and Universal Sentence Encoder (USE), and three classification algorithms: XGBoost, support vector machines, and dense neural network layer. We aimed to classify 25 participants with ASD and 25 participants with typical development (TD) based on their narrations produced during the Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule, Second Edition (ADOS-2) picture book task. The results of computational approaches were compared with the results of standardized testing and classifications made by two psychiatrists (raters). The raters were asked to read utterances produced by a participant (without an examiner’s statements and additional information) and assign a participant to one of the two groups: ASD or with typical development (TD). OUTCOMES & RESULTS: The computer-based models had higher sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive values and negative predictive values than the raters, and lower than the two standardized instruments: ADOS-2 and Social Communication Questionnaire (SCQ). CONCLUSIONS & IMPLICATIONS: Our findings lay the groundwork for future studies involving deep neural network-based text representation models as tools for augmenting the ASD diagnosis or screening. Both ELMo and USE text encoders provided promising specificities, sensitivities, positive predictive values and negative predictive values. Our results indicate the usefulness of page-level embeddings for utterance representation in ADOS-2 picture book task. WHAT THIS PAPER ADDS: What is already known on this subject Deficits in the use of language in social contexts, and narrative ability in particular, are observed across the autism spectrum. Most research on narrative skills has applied hand-coding methods. Hitherto, machine-learning methods were used mostly for image recognition problems and data from screening questionnaires for ASD classification. Detection of mental and developmental disorders from textual input is an emerging field for machine and deep-learning methods. What this paper adds to existing knowledge This study explored the ability of several types of deep neural network-based text representation models to detect ASD. Both ELMo and USE provided the most promising values of specificity, sensitivity, positive predictive values and negative predictive values. What are the potential or actual clinical implications of this work? Competitive accuracy, repeatability, speed and ease of operation are all advantages of computerized methods. They allow for objective and quantitative assessment of narrative ability and complex language skills. Deep neural network-based text representation models could in the future support clinicians and augment the decision-making process related to ASD diagnosis, screening and intervention planning.

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7. Yue X, Zhang G, Li X, Shen Y, Wei W, Bai Y, Luo Y, Wei H, Li Z, Zhang X, Wang M. Abnormal Dynamic Functional Network Connectivity in Adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder. Clin Neuroradiol;2022 (May 11)

PURPOSE: This study sought to explore changes of brain dynamic functional network connectivity (dFNC) in adults with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and investigate their relationship with clinical manifestations. METHODS: Resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rs-fMRI) data were acquired from 78 adult ASD patients from autism brain imaging data exchange datasets, and 65 age-matched healthy controls subjects from the local community. Independent component analysis was conducted to evaluate dFNC patterns on the basis of 13 independent components (ICs) within 11 resting-state networks (RSN), namely, auditory network (AUDN), basal ganglia network (BGN), language network (LN), sensorimotor network (SMN), precuneus network (PUCN), salience network (SN), visuospatial network (VSN), dorsal default mode network (dDMN), high visual network (hVIS), primary visual network (pVIS), ventral default mode network (vDMN). Fraction time, mean dwell time, number of transitions, and RSN connectivity were calculated for group comparisons. Correlation analyses were performed between abnormal metrics and autism diagnostic observation schedule (ADOS) scores. RESULTS: Compared with controls, ASD patients had higher fraction time and mean dwell time in state 2 (P = 0.017, P = 0.014). Reduced dFNC was found in the SMN with PUCN, SMN with hVIS, and increased dFNC was observed in the dDMN with SN in state 2 in the ASD group. Fraction time and mean dwell time was positively correlated with stereotyped behavior scores of ADOS. CONCLUSION: The findings demonstrated the importance of evaluating transient alterations in specific neural networks of adult ASD patients. The abnormal metrics and connectivity may be related to symptoms such as stereotyped behavior.

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8. Zhang A, Sokolova I, Domissy A, Davis J, Rao L, Hana Utami K, Wang Y, Hagerman RJ, Pouladi MA, Sanna P, Boland MJ, Loring JF. Maturation Delay of Human GABAergic Neurogenesis in Fragile X Syndrome Pluripotent Stem Cells. Stem Cells Transl Med;2022 (May 12)

Fragile X Syndrome (FXS), the leading monogenic cause of intellectual disability and autism spectrum disorder, is caused by expansion of a CGG trinucleotide repeat in the 5′-UTR of the Fragile X Mental Retardation-1 (FMR1) gene. Epigenetic silencing of FMR1 results in loss of the Fragile X Mental Retardation Protein (FMRP). Although most studies to date have focused on excitatory neurons, recent evidence suggests that GABAergic inhibitory networks are also affected. To investigate human GABAergic neurogenesis, we established a method to reproducibly derive inhibitory neurons from multiple FXS and control human pluripotent stem cell (hPSC) lines. Electrophysiological analyses suggested that the developing FXS neurons had a delay in the GABA functional switch, a transition in fetal development that converts the GABAA channel’s function from depolarization to hyperpolarization, with profound effects on the developing brain. To investigate the cause of this delay, we analyzed 14 400 single-cell transcriptomes from FXS and control cells at 2 stages of GABAergic neurogenesis. While control and FXS cells were similar at the earlier time point, the later-stage FXS cells retained expression of neuroblast proliferation-associated genes and had lower levels of genes associated with action potential regulation, synapses, and mitochondria compared with controls. Our analysis suggests that loss of FMRP prolongs the proliferative stage of progenitors, which may result in more neurons remaining immature during the later stages of neurogenesis. This could have profound implications for homeostatic excitatory-inhibitory circuit development in FXS, and suggests a novel direction for understanding disease mechanisms that may help to guide therapeutic interventions.

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9. Hannawi AP, Knight C, Grelotti DJ, Trauner DA. Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic-Associated Social Changes on Boys with Moderate to Severe Autism. Adv Neurodev Disord;2022 (May 6):1-5.

OBJECTIVES: The COVID-19 pandemic and the resulting social changes have made unprecedented changes in our lifetime with unknown repercussions on children with autism spectrum disorders. We sought to assess the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic and resulting social changes on boys with autism spectrum disorder. METHODS: We conducted a survey using the CRISIS-AFAR questionnaire of caregivers of a population of boys (n = 40) with moderate to severe autism spectrum disorder for changes in environment and behavior before and after the pandemic. RESULTS: We found several interesting findings, including an increase in self-injurious behaviors after the start of the pandemic, but not in the level of hyperactivity, anxiety, or aggressive behavior, or amount and frequency of stereotypies/repetitive behaviors in the children before and after the start of the pandemic. There was an increased difficulty in adjusting to new daily routines after the pandemic, as well as increased difficulty falling asleep. CONCLUSIONS: The study showed that a majority of boys with moderate/severe autism in our study were negatively affected by the pandemic across several domains. Additionally, this study highlights the need for educational and mental health resources to be prepared for similar events in the future.

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10. Le J, Zhang L, Zhao W, Zhu S, Lan C, Kou J, Zhang Q, Zhang Y, Li Q, Chen Z, Fu M, Montag C, Zhang R, Yang W, Becker B, Kendrick KM. Infrequent Intranasal Oxytocin Followed by Positive Social Interaction Improves Symptoms in Autistic Children: A Pilot Randomized Clinical Trial. Psychother Psychosom;2022 (May 11):1-13.

INTRODUCTION: There are currently no approved drug interventions for social behavior dysfunction in autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Previous trials investigating effects of daily intranasal oxytocin treatment have reported inconsistent results and have not combined it with positive social interaction. However, in two preclinical studies we established that treatment every other day rather than daily is more efficacious in maintaining neural and behavioral effects by reducing receptor desensitization. OBJECTIVE: We aimed to establish whether a 6-week intranasal oxytocin compared with placebo treatment, followed by a period of positive social interaction, would produce reliable symptom improvements in children with ASD. METHODS: A pilot double-blind, randomized, crossover design trial was completed including 41 children with ASD aged 3-8 years. Primary outcomes were the Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule-2 (ADOS-2) and social responsivity scale-2 (SRS-2). Secondary measures included cognitive, autism- and caregiver-related questionnaires, and social attention assessed using eye-tracking. RESULTS: Significant improvements were found for oxytocin relative to placebo in primary outcome measures (total ADOS-2 and SRS-2 scores, ps < 0.001) and in behavioral adaptability and repetitive behavior secondary measures. Altered SRS-2 scores were associated with increased saliva oxytocin concentrations. Additionally, oxytocin significantly increased time spent viewing dynamic social compared to geometric stimuli and the eyes of angry, happy, and neutral expression faces. There were no adverse side effects of oxytocin treatment. CONCLUSIONS: Overall, results demonstrate that a 6-week intranasal oxytocin treatment administered every other day and followed by positive social interactions can improve clinical, eye tracking, and questionnaire-based assessments of symptoms in young autistic children.

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11. Holloway JM, Tomlinson SM, Hardwick DD. Strategies to Support Learning of Gross Motor Tasks in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Scoping Review. Phys Occup Ther Pediatr;2022 (May 10):1-17.

AIMS: Children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) display motor difficulties that may impact social and communication interactions and participation in everyday activities. These difficulties may be related to a difference in the way they learn new skills. Therefore, strategies to support motor learning to optimize skill acquisition and retention may be beneficial. This scoping review described current motor learning strategies used to optimize acquisition, retention, transfer, and generalizability of motor tasks in children with ASD. METHODS: Three databases were searched from inception through 2021. Studies were included if they involved participants with ASD ≤ 18 years old, evaluated learning of a novel gross motor task, manipulated a motor learning variable, and were written in English. RESULTS: Twenty-two articles met eligibility criteria. Most articles examined strategies that manipulated the instruction of task, with few articles examining feedback or practice. Skill acquisition was the most represented motor learning outcome, with fewer studies examining retention, transfer, or generalizability. CONCLUSIONS: Positive results in 95% of the articles suggest that the use of support strategies to optimize motor learning is feasible and beneficial for children with ASD, and that modifications to instruction, feedback, and practice schedules should be considered in motor interventions.

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12. Manyukhina VO, Prokofyev AO, Galuta IA, Goiaeva DE, Obukhova TS, Schneiderman JF, Altukhov DI, Stroganova TA, Orekhova EV. Globally elevated excitation-inhibition ratio in children with autism spectrum disorder and below-average intelligence. Mol Autism;2022 (May 12);13(1):20.

BACKGROUND: Altered neuronal excitation-inhibition (E-I) balance is strongly implicated in ASD. However, it is not known whether the direction and degree of changes in the E-I ratio in individuals with ASD correlates with intellectual disability often associated with this developmental disorder. The spectral slope of the aperiodic 1/f activity reflects the E-I balance at the scale of large neuronal populations and may uncover its putative alternations in individuals with ASD with and without intellectual disability. METHODS: Herein, we used magnetoencephalography (MEG) to test whether the 1/f slope would differentiate ASD children with average and below-average (< 85) IQ. MEG was recorded at rest with eyes open/closed in 49 boys with ASD aged 6-15 years with IQ ranging from 54 to 128, and in 49 age-matched typically developing (TD) boys. The cortical source activity was estimated using the beamformer approach and individual brain models. We then extracted the 1/f slope by fitting a linear function to the log-log-scale power spectra in the high-frequency range. RESULTS: The global 1/f slope averaged over all cortical sources demonstrated high rank-order stability between the two conditions. Consistent with previous research, it was steeper in the eyes-closed than in the eyes-open condition and flattened with age. Regardless of condition, children with ASD and below-average IQ had flatter slopes than either TD or ASD children with average or above-average IQ. These group differences could not be explained by differences in signal-to-noise ratio or periodic (alpha and beta) activity. LIMITATIONS: Further research is needed to find out whether the observed changes in E-I ratios are characteristic of children with below-average IQ of other diagnostic groups. CONCLUSIONS: The atypically flattened spectral slope of aperiodic activity in children with ASD and below-average IQ suggests a shift of the global E-I balance toward hyper-excitation. The spectral slope can provide an accessible noninvasive biomarker of the E-I ratio for making objective judgments about treatment effectiveness in people with ASD and comorbid intellectual disability.

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13. Tajima H, Ogawa J, Nose I, Pawankar R, Maeda M, Momota Y, Kakinuma M. Effect of Childhood Disease on Hospital Presentation: A Survey of Pediatricians. J Nippon Med Sch;2022 (May 12);89(2):190-195.

BACKGROUND: Determining when caregivers should take their children to a hospital is crucial in ensuring the health and safety of children. Because children cannot make these decisions on their own, caregivers bear the core responsibility for the wellness of their children. The aim of this study was to determine how disease, disability, and child behavior affect when and how often caregivers take their children to a hospital. METHODS: A structured anonymous online survey was circulated to pediatricians in Japan. Pediatricians were queried about the characteristics of their patients, including reactivity to pain, expression of pain, behavior at the hospital, and the timing of presentation. Patients were school-aged children and included those with autism spectrum disorder, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, Down syndrome, mental retardation, epilepsy, premature birth, and allergies. RESULTS: Sixty-eight of 80 pediatricians responded to the survey (85% response rate). The results indicated that caregivers of children with autism spectrum disorder, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, and mental retardation took them to the hospital later than was optimal. Conversely, children born prematurely and those with allergies were taken to hospitals even when symptoms were mild. CONCLUSIONS: Caregivers make decisions on when to present to hospital on the basis of their child’s expression of pain and behavior. Guidelines should be developed to assist caregivers in determining when to present for treatment at a hospital.

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14. Kapral E. Overcoming barriers to dental care for adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities. Quintessence Int;2022 (May 11);53(6):469-470.

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15. Golos A, Ben-Zur H, Chapani SI. Participation in preschool activities of children with autistic spectrum disorder and comparison to typically developing children. Res Dev Disabil;2022 (May 12);127:104252.

BACKGROUND: Participation is essential to children’s development and is a major focus of intervention. This study aimed to describe the participation patterns of children with ASD, in comparison to typically developing (TD) children. METHODS: 70 preschoolers participated: 33 children with ASD, attending non-inclusive-education settings; and 37 TD children, attending mainstream educational settings. Two occupational therapists assessed their participation through structured observations in self-care activities, play, learning, and social participation areas; demographic and environmental questionnaires were also completed. RESULTS: In the ASD group, frequency of participation was found to be significantly higher in ADL and learning than in other areas; level of performance was found to be significantly lower in social participation than in other areas. The TD group scored significantly higher than did the ASD group in most areas and scales. Initial findings tentatively showed that a structured educational environment for children with ASD may increase participation frequency. CONCLUSIONS: The findings are consistent with recognized disabilities in play and social participation among children with ASD, and their limitations in participation, compared to their TD peers in most areas. Further studies are needed to evaluate additional psychometric properties of the different scales, and the impact of educational environments on participation.

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16. Chen Y, Zhou Z, Cao M, Liu M, Lin Z, Yang W, Yang X, Dhaidhai D, Xiong P. Extended Reality (XR) and telehealth interventions for children or adolescents with autism spectrum disorder: Systematic review of qualitative and quantitative studies. Neurosci Biobehav Rev;2022 (May 12);138:104683.

World Health Organization reported that almost one in 100 children is diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) worldwide. Extended Reality (XR) and Telehealth interventions are evident to be effective for ASD treatments. While there is no comprehensive systematic review to summarize and evaluate the evidence for promoting the accessibility of different technology-based treatment regiments. This paper aims to verify the efficacy and validity of XR and Telehealth interventions for children and adolescents with ASD. We reviewed 112 studies from databases of PubMed, Web of Science and Cochrane Library, published in English between January 2010 to April 1st, 2022. We found that after interventions, positive improvements for ASD participants were observed in social interaction, acceptance, and engagement, communication and speech, emotion recognition and control, daily living skill, problem behavior reduction, attention, cost reduction, anxiety symptom reduction, pretend play, contextual processing, match to sample skill, and insomnia control. Our findings provide a solid and positive evidence of XR and Telehealth interventions in improving the treatment outcomes for children and adolescents with ASD. In the future, more research with RCTs and standardized outcome measurements are required to establish the therapeutic efficiency of the two interventions independently or combined.

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17. Mahler K, Hample K, Jones C, Sensenig J, Thomasco P, Hilton C. Impact of an Interoception-Based Program on Emotion Regulation in Autistic Children. Occup Ther Int;2022;2022:9328967.

PURPOSE: The aim of this study was to determine the feasibility and effectiveness of a 25-week school-based intervention and its ability to improve interoception and emotion regulation in an autistic pediatric population. METHOD: One-group pre- and posttest design implementing The Interoception Curriculum: A Guide to Developing Mindful Self-Regulation in a self-contained school. Participants were 14 (11 male, 3 female) students between 9 and 19 years old. The Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Function 2 (BRIEF-2) and the Caregiver Questionnaire for Interoceptive Awareness-2nd Edition (CQIA-2) were used to determine changes in interoceptive awareness and emotion regulation. RESULTS: Statistically significant improvements were found between the preintervention and postintervention scores for both interoceptive awareness and emotion regulation. CONCLUSION: This was the first study to examine the Interoception Curriculum in its entirety, providing evidence that the use of the Interoception Curriculum is feasible in a school setting and suggests that this intervention is effective for improvement of interoception. Findings also suggest that this improvement in interoception is related to improvement in emotional regulation for an autistic pediatric population.

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18. Wilson NJ, Lin Z, Pithouse M, Morrison B, Sumar B, George A. Qualitative Insights from A Novel Staff-Led Oral Health Champions Program Within a Residential Service For People With Intellectual and Developmental Disability. J Intellect Disabil;2022 (May 12):17446295221095654.

The oral health of people with intellectual and developmental disability is poorer than that of the general community. Any solution for people with intellectual and developmental disability living in residential services needs to include disability support workers (DSWs). Previous studies have used either didactic or train-the-trainer approaches to enhance DSW knowledge and skills. Taking a different approach, a novel program used DSWs as embedded oral health champions. This model provided educational opportunities for DSWs to learn about good oral health and then share with peers and provide benefits to people with intellectual and developmental disability that they support. Interviews with a sample of these champions were conducted and analysed using content analysis. Findings suggest that DSWs are capable of affecting change with the right type and depth of training, management and organisational support. A DSW-led champions model has merit, however requires ongoing expert support to help maintain and sustain benefits over time.

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