Self-Regulation and Sleep in Children At Risk for Autism Spectrum Disorders

描述（由申请人提供）：本研究的总体目标是更好地了解自闭症谱系障碍（ASD）风险幼儿的自我调节发展，并阐明这些儿童自我调节与睡眠之间的纵向关联。研究自闭症儿童的兄弟姐妹是至关重要的，因为他们不仅有自闭症的风险，而且还有许多负面的发展结果，包括语言、社会情感功能、注意力、行为和认知方面的困难。先前对有ASD风险的婴儿兄弟姐妹的研究主要集中在三个核心缺陷领域，即沟通、社交和限制/重复行为，但最近的研究和初步数据表明，这一群体的困难更广泛地扩展到自我调节的困难。具体来说，自闭症儿童的兄弟姐妹在注意力、行为和负面情绪控制方面的问题似乎有所增加。这些区域的困难与睡眠密切相关。有睡眠问题的儿童在注意力和行为控制方面有更多的困难，表现出更多的负面影响和情绪反应。需要对自闭症儿童的兄弟姐妹进行进一步的研究，以阐明他们的不良发育结果，拟议的研究旨在在自我调节和睡眠领域进行研究。提出了两项研究来检查两组儿童的自我调节和睡眠问题以及它们之间的动态发展进程：自闭症儿童的婴儿兄弟姐妹（高风险）和正常发育儿童的婴儿兄弟姐妹（低风险）。首先是一项横断面研究，研究了24个月和36个月大的高风险婴儿兄弟姐妹的自我调节率和睡眠问题。第二项是一项前瞻性纵向研究，对18、24和30个月大的儿童进行评估，以检查发育进程以及自我调节与睡眠之间的关系。在每项研究中，自我调节和睡眠将通过行为、生理和父母报告的方式进行评估。这一研究的最终意义在于，通过引起人们对自我调节和睡眠这一经常被忽视的发展领域的关注，改善有自闭症风险儿童的发展轨迹和家庭生活。了解睡眠问题的发生率以及睡眠在自我调节中的作用，有可能为评估、治疗和育儿指南提供信息。Schwichtenberg博士在自我调节和睡眠发展方面的教育和研究经验是拟议研究的理想人选。她在睡眠的生理评估和两种行为自我调节范式方面接受过专门的培训。她在睡眠和自我调节方面的知识包括评估程序、编码、筛选和分析，并在这两个领域发表了文章。施维希滕贝格博士还曾参与过两项关于儿童发育风险的前瞻性纵向研究，这使她敏锐地意识到完成这样一项研究所需要的现实生活考虑因素。通过本申请中提出的培训，她将获得最终的临床、方法学、统计学和实验室管理技能，从而从博士后学者转变为独立研究人员，在风险儿童自我调节和睡眠的发展过程中进行独特的研究。Schwichtenberg博士的职业目标是在一所拥有发育障碍中心的大学获得心理学或人类发展学系的终身职位，并成立一个研究实验室，研究患有发育障碍和有发育障碍风险的幼儿的各种自我调节能力。施维希滕贝格博士的培训计划将在加州大学戴维斯分校M.I.N.D.研究所（神经发育障碍医学调查），这是发育障碍领域最重要的卓越研究中心之一。她的培训包括提高临床评估技能，学习专业的无创睡眠评估技术（视频睡眠记录仪），获得纵向数据分析的高级统计培训，学习眼动追踪评估和编码方法，并完成实验室管理和领导方面的结构化培训。她的赞助者Sally Ozonoff博士和Thomas Anders博士是自闭症和睡眠领域的两位国际知名学者，他们致力于她的培训和未来的成功。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The overarching goals of this research are to better understand the development of self-regulation in young children at risk for Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) and to elucidate the longitudinal associations between self-regulation and sleep in these children. It is critically important to study the infant siblings of children with ASD because they are at risk not only for ASD, but also for numerous negative developmental outcomes including difficulties in language, social-emotional functioning, attention, behavior and cognition. Previous studies of infant siblings at risk for ASD have focused mainly on the three core deficit areas of communication, social, and restricted/repetitive behavior, but recent research and preliminary data suggest that difficulties of this group extend more broadly to difficulties with self-regulation. Specifically, problems with attention, behavior and negative emotion control appear elevated in infant siblings of children with ASD. Difficulties in these areas are robustly associated with sleep. Children with sleep problems have more difficulties with attention and behavior control and exhibit more negative affect and emotional reactivity. Additional research on siblings of children with ASD is needed to elucidate their adverse developmental outcomes and the proposed studies aim to do this within the domains of self-regulation and sleep. Two studies are proposed to examine self-regulation and sleep problems and the dynamic developmental progression between them in two groups of children: infant siblings of children with ASD (high risk) and infant siblings of typically developing children (low risk). The first is a cross-sectional study examining the rates of self-regulation and sleep problems in high risk infant siblings at 24 and 36 months of age. The second is a prospective longitudinal study that assesses children at 18, 24, and 30 months of age to examine the developmental progression and associations between self-regulation and sleep. Within each study self-regulation and sleep will be assessed with behavioral, physiological, and parent-report measures. The ultimate significance of this line of research is to improve the developmental trajectories and family life of children at risk for ASD by drawing attention to often unconsidered areas of development: self-regulation and sleep. Understanding the rates of sleep problems and the roles of sleep in self-regulation has the potential to inform assessment, treatment and parenting guidelines. Dr. Schwichtenberg is an ideal candidate for the proposed studies with her educational and research experience in self-regulation and sleep development. She has specialized training in the physiological assessment of sleep and two behavioral self-regulation paradigms. Her knowledge of sleep and self- regulation includes assessment procedures, coding, screening, and analyzing and she has published in both areas. Dr. Schwichtenberg also has experience on two prospective longitudinal studies of children developing at risk, making her keenly aware of the real life considerations needed to complete such a study. With the training proposed in this application she will secure the final clinical, methodological, statistical, and lab management skills needed to transition from a postdoctoral scholar to an independent researcher with a unique line of research in the developmental processes of self-regulation and sleep in children developing at risk. Dr. Schwichtenberg's career goals are to obtain a tenure-track position in a department of Psychology or Human Development at a university with an established developmental disabilities center and to launch a research lab that studies a variety of self-regulatory capacities in young children with and at risk for developmental disabilities. Dr. Schwichtenberg's training plan will be carried out at one of the foremost centers for excellence in developmental disabilities, the University of California - Davis, M.I.N.D. Institute (Medical Investigation of Neurodevelopmental Disorders). Her training includes advancing her skills in clinical assessment, learning a specialized non-invasive sleep assessment technique (videosomnography), securing advanced statistical training in longitudinal data analysis, learning eye-tracking assessment and coding methods, and completing structured training in laboratory management and leadership. Her sponsors Dr. Sally Ozonoff and Dr. Thomas Anders are two internationally recognized scholars in the areas of autism and sleep and are dedicated to her training and future success. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: The goals of this research are to better understand the range of difficulties that younger siblings of children with autism experience. Previous research has documented that they are at increased risk for autism and language delays but recently emerging data suggest that they are at risk for several other difficulties, including self-regulatory problems (e.g., poor control of behavior, attention, and emotion) and sleep problems. This application aims to better understand the development of self-regulation and sleep in young children at risk for autism, thereby improving their development and family life and informing assessment, treatment and parenting guidelines.