Family Outcomes in Autism Spectrum Disorders

描述（由申请人提供）：据估计，在美国，每88名儿童中就有一名被诊断患有自闭症谱系障碍（ASD）。很少有残疾比ASD对父母的压力更大。有理论和经验证据表明，长期的父母压力会影响婚姻适应。该项目的总体目标是研究自闭症儿童的自闭症症状和行为问题与婚姻调整之间的家庭内关联，因为这些过程在自然主义背景下和三年内展开。具体的研究目标是：1）将自闭症儿童夫妇的自我报告和观察到的婚姻调整与无残疾儿童的夫妇进行比较。2)测试家庭内儿童症状和行为问题对夫妻互动的日常时间影响。3)研究跨越三年的四波数据收集的全球自我报告和观察到的婚姻调整轨迹。 总共有175对已婚夫妇，他们有一个5到12岁的ASD孩子，他们将参加这项研究。研究变量将通过自我报告和教师报告的措施进行评估，并在为期三年的四波数据收集中进行直接观察。一个由150对无残疾儿童的已婚夫妇组成的匹配对照组也将在第一时间参加，以了解自闭症儿童家庭的过程与规范经验的不同。婚姻适应与儿童症状和行为问题之间的关联将使用微观尺度（时间1的14天每日日记）和宏观尺度（跨越三年的四波数据收集）来检验，微观尺度用于检验自然和自发背景下真实的时间日常关联的展开，宏观尺度用于检验这些变量之间的长期时间顺序路径。我们的主要分析单位是夫妇，个人（丈夫和妻子）嵌套在夫妇中。将使用多变量多层次模型来处理在多个时间点收集的配偶数据的相互依赖性（Raudenbush和Bryk，2002年）。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): It is now estimated that one in 88 children in the U.S. are diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Few disabilities are more stressful on parents than ASD. There is theoretical and empirical evidence to suggest that chronic parenting stress affects marital adjustment. The overarching goal of this project is to examine the within-family associations between the autism symptoms and behavior problems of children with ASDs and marital adjustment as these processes unfold in naturalistic contexts and across three years. The specific study aims are: 1) Compare the self-reported and observed marital adjustment of couples of children with ASDs as compared to couples who have children without disabilities. 2) Test the within-family day-to-day temporal effects of child symptoms and behavior problems on couple interactions. 3) Examine the trajectories of global self-reported and observed marital adjustment across four waves of data collection spanning three years. In total, 175 married couples who have a child with an ASD aged five to 12 years will participate in the study. Study variables will be assessed through self-reported and teacher-reported measures and direct observations across four waves of data collection spanning three years. A matched comparison group of 150 married couples of children without a disability will also participate at Time 1 to understand how the processes in families of children with ASDs differ from normative experiences. Associations between marital adjustment and child symptoms and behavior problems will be examined using both a micro-level scale (14-day daily diary at Time 1), to examine the unfolding of real time day-to-day associations in their natural and spontaneous context, and a macro-level scale (four waves of data collection spanning three years), to examine the longer-term time-order pathways between these variables. Our primary unit of analysis is the couple, with individuals (husbands and wives) nested within couples. Multivariate multilevel modeling will be used to handle the inter-dependence of spouses' data collected at multiple time points (Raudenbush & Bryk, 2002).