CliniKids, Telethon Kids Institute, 100 Roberts Rd, Subiaco, Western Australia 6008, Australia; School of Psychological Science, The University of Western Australia, 35 Stirling Hwy, Crawley, Western Australia 6009, Australia.
School of Psychological Science, The University of Western Australia, 35 Stirling Hwy, Crawley, Western Australia 6009, Australia.
Infant Behav Dev. 2021 May;63:101570. doi: 10.1016/j.infbeh.2021.101570. Epub 2021 May 1.
Several studies have explored relationships between parent broader autism phenotype and offspring communication, and have reported that autistic-like traits in parents are related to offspring communication difficulties and autism severity. However, past research has focused on studying such associations in childhood and we know very little about them in infancy. With accumulating evidence that interventions administered during infancy may be most effective in reducing ASD symptoms, it is imperative to examine whether relationships between parent autistic-like traits and child communication appear even earlier during this critical period of life.
This longitudinal study collected data from infant siblings of autistic children (N = 32) and infants with no family history of autism (N = 45) to explore how autistic-like traits in parents related to child developmental outcomes during infancy.
Parental communication difficulties and autistic-like traits were found to be associated with a range of child behaviours in the first two years of life, including social-emotional difficulties at 6 and 24 months, lower communication and emerging cognition at 24 months, and increased autistic behaviours at 24 months.
Based on the results, it appears that some of the difficulties seen in parents are relayed to children genetically. These findings contribute to ASD research concerning early communication development in children and heritability of ASD traits and may have important implications in monitoring child development. Furthermore, since the current study found a significant association between autistic traits in parents and child social-emotional behaviour as early as 6 months of age, it provides evidence of the value of assessing interventions that target infancy.
多项研究探索了父母广泛自闭症表型与子女沟通之间的关系，并报告称，父母的自闭症样特征与子女沟通困难和自闭症严重程度有关。然而，过去的研究主要集中在研究儿童时期的这种关联，我们对婴儿期的了解甚少。由于越来越多的证据表明，在婴儿期进行干预可能最有效地减少 ASD 症状，因此，有必要研究父母的自闭症样特征与儿童沟通之间的关系是否在生命的这个关键时期更早出现。
这项纵向研究从自闭症儿童的婴儿兄弟姐妹（N=32）和没有自闭症家族史的婴儿（N=45）中收集数据，以探索父母的自闭症样特征如何与婴儿期的儿童发展结果相关。
研究发现，父母的沟通困难和自闭症样特征与儿童生命前两年的一系列行为相关，包括 6 个月和 24 个月时的社交情感困难、24 个月时的沟通和新兴认知较低、以及 24 个月时的自闭症行为增加。
基于这些结果，似乎父母身上的一些困难是遗传给孩子的。这些发现为自闭症谱系障碍儿童早期沟通发展和自闭症谱系障碍特征的遗传性研究做出了贡献，并可能对儿童发育监测具有重要意义。此外，由于本研究发现父母的自闭症特征与儿童社会情感行为早在 6 个月大时就存在显著关联，因此为评估针对婴儿期的干预措施的价值提供了证据。
