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Researchers have shown that the so called 'autism epidemic' is due to an increase in the diagnosis of children with less severe behavioural symptoms.
Andrew Kandice Matt Melissa Videos Whitehouse Watch and listen to Andrew Varcin Cooper Licari PhD M.Psych (Clinical), PhD BCA Marketing, BSc
Pre-reading language skills develop rapidly in early childhood and are related to brain structure and functional architecture in young children prior to formal education. However, the early neurobiological development that supports these skills is not well understood.
The Kids' autism research takes place at CliniKids, a centre that integrates world-class research with a clinical service for children with developmental delay and/or autism and their families.
The Quality of Life Inventory - Disability
Preterm birth is associated with a 3.3-fold increased likelihood of autism diagnosis, with lower gestational age conferring higher likelihood. In Australia, autism is typically diagnosed at around age four, potentially missing the optimal neuroplasticity window before age two. The Social Attention and Communication Surveillance-Revised (SACS-R) tool identifies early autism signs in children aged 11-30 months, enabling pre-emptive intervention.
Eye-tracking could expedite autism identification/diagnosis through standardisation and objectivity. We tested whether Gazefinder autism assessment, with Classification Algorithm derived from gaze fixation durations, would have good accuracy (area under the curve [AUC] ≥ 0.80) to differentiate 2-4-year-old autistic from non-autistic children.
Harmonizing the scores obtained by different instruments that measure the same construct enable researchers to combine them in one analysis. An important step in harmonization is checking whether there is measurement invariance across populations.
Social motivation is posited as a key factor in the expression of the autism phenotype. However, lack of precision in both conceptualization and measurement has impeded a thorough understanding of its diverse presentation and associated outcomes. This study addresses this gap by identifying subgroups of autism characterized by deficits in distinct facets of social motivation, relative to normative benchmarks.
Empathy, a complex and multidimensional construct essential for social functioning and mental health, has been extensively studied in both research and clinical settings. The Perth Empathy Scale (PES), a recently developed self-report measure, assesses cognitive and affective empathy across both positive and negative emotions and is based on the self-other model of empathy. This study aimed to evaluate the psychometric properties of the Persian version of the PES in large Iranian sample.