Longitudinal Investigation of Social-Communication and Attention Processes in School-Aged Children at Genetic Risk for Autism

项目摘要/摘要 在美国，每68名儿童中就有一名患有自闭症谱系障碍(ASD)。随着流行率的上升 自闭症是自闭症儿童的兄弟姐妹的比率。之前的多项研究已经证明 许多ASD患者的一级亲属都经历了他们自己的挑战，不仅包括更高的 自闭症的发生率，但社交和沟通困难、注意力问题以及情绪和焦虑的程度也较轻 症状。在过去的十年里，包括我们自己在内的多项调查在纵向上后来- 出生的兄弟姐妹在婴儿期就被登记在册，在父母对他们的发展感到担忧之前。这 为研究儿童精神病理学的发展提供了理想的样本，因为它不仅是 相对不偏向于选择性招生，但也以较高的次优结果比率为特点。 患有自闭症儿童的晚生兄弟姐妹在3岁时发育不典型的比率很高(高达30%)，但 很少有研究跟踪他们到学龄期，这使得很难确定早期的差异 坚持不懈和/或随着年龄的增长出现新的困难。需要知道的是，由于ASD的流行 对患有自闭症儿童的兄弟姐妹的长期发育影响是什么？ 这种不断增长的人口是否需要更密集的早期监测、筛查和干预。 拟议的项目有三个目标，每个目标都检查儿童的发展和心理健康功能 自闭症儿童的学龄儿童兄弟姐妹。这三个目标都利用了之前的资金，纵向上是3 婴儿时期确诊的患有自闭症儿童(n=166)或典型发育儿童(n=134)的年幼兄弟姐妹队列 并在7岁以下，从出生到36个月定期进行评估。样本年龄目前为6至16岁。 我们现在建议再评估两次，大约相隔两年，以检查多个 社会沟通、注意力、焦虑和认知控制过程的维度测量。分析 将考察这些领域当前表现水平的群体差异，以及婴儿对 稍后才能发挥作用。我们还将使用多种功能障碍的测量方法来探索个体 社交沟通过程、注意力和认知控制的变化与后来的适应有关 家庭、同伴和学校环境。 这个项目通过纵向研究一个高风险的样本，以获得多个不理想的发育结果， 提供了研究未来精神病理和损伤的非常早期预测因素的机会。这将是 加强早期识别和治疗开发工作，并为未来做好准备 对多种神经发育和精神疾病高危个体的基因组和神经生物学研究 健康状况。

PROJECT SUMMARY / ABSTRACT Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) affects 1 in 68 children in the United States. Rising along with the prevalence of ASD is the rate of being a sibling of a child with ASD. Multiple previous studies have demonstrated that many first-degree relatives of individuals with ASD experience their own challenges, including not only higher rates of ASD, but also milder social and communication difficulties, attention problems, and mood and anxiety symptoms. In the past decade, multiple investigations, including our own, have followed longitudinally later- born siblings who were enrolled in infancy, before parent concerns about their development were likely. This provides an ideal sample in which to study the development of childhood psychopathology, since it is not only relatively unbiased by selective enrollment, but is also characterized by a high rate of suboptimal outcomes. Rates of atypical development in later-born siblings of children with ASD are high (up to 30%) at age 3, but very few studies have followed them to school-age, making it difficult to determine whether early differences persist and/or new difficulties emerge with age. What is imperative to know, as the prevalence of ASD continues to increase, is what the longer-term developmental effects on siblings of children with ASD are, and whether this growing population requires more intensive early surveillance, screening, and intervention. The proposed project has three aims, each of which examines developmental and mental health functioning of school-aged siblings of children with ASD. All three aims leverage previous funding, following longitudinally 3 cohorts of younger siblings of children with ASD (n=166) or typical development (n=134) ascertained in infancy and assessed regularly, at up to 7 ages, from birth to 36 months. The sample is currently aged 6 to 16 years and we now propose to assess them twice more, approximately two years apart, to examine multiple dimensional measures of social-communication, attention, anxiety, and cognitive control processes. Analyses will examine group differences in current levels of performance in these domains, as well as infant predictors of later functioning. We will also employ multiple measures of functional impairment to explore how individual variations in social-communication processes, attention, and cognitive control are related to later adjustment in home, peer, and school contexts. This project, by studying longitudinally a sample at high risk for multiple suboptimal developmental outcomes, provides the opportunity to study very early predictors of later psychopathology and impairment. This will enhance both early identification and treatment development efforts, as well as set the stage for future genomic and neurobiological studies of individuals at risk for a wide range of neurodevelopmental and mental health conditions.