30867
Predicting Anxiety from Developmental Trajectories of Temperament in Children at Risk for Autism Spectrum Disorder: The Role of Reactivity and Regulation
Poster Presentation
Friday, May 3, 2019: 5:30 PM-7:00 PM
Room: 710 (Palais des congres de Montreal)
M. Ersoy1, T. Charman2, G. Pasco3, E. Carr4, M. H. Johnson5, E. J. Jones6 and &. the BASIS Team7, (1)Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King's College London, UK, London, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, (2)Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King’s College London, London, United Kingdom, (3)Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King's College London, London, United Kingdom, (4)Biostatistics & Health Informatics, King's College London, London, United Kingdom, (5)Centre of Brain and Cognitive Development, Birkbeck College, University of London, London, United Kingdom, (6)Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development, Birkbeck, University of London, London, United Kingdom, (7)Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development, Birkbeck University of London, London, United Kingdom
Background: The mechanisms underlying heightened levels of co-occurring anxiety in children and adolescents with ASD have been poorly understood. Evidence suggests that interplay between temperamental reactivity (behavioural inhibition; BI) and regulation (effortful control; EC) in the early years of life plays a substantial role in anxiety problems in the general population. Determining whether anxiety traits in ASD are underpinned by the same developmental mechanisms in the context of a cohort at familial risk for ASD as anxiety in the general population is important because it may impact on appropriate treatment strategies.
Objectives: To investigate this, we used structural equation modelling to (1) assess whether higher levels of BI predicts anxiety; (2) examine how BI and EC interrelate over the first two years of life and how this interrelation associates with later anxiety and ASD (Figure 1); also we used mediation analyses to (4) probe the relationship between BI, EC (24 months), and later anxiety/ASD (36 months).
Methods: The sample in this study includes 116 high-risk (due to having an older sibling with ASD) and 27 low-risk (due to having no family members with ASD) children. Parent-report measures used to measure temperament (9, 15 and 24 months), anxiety and ASD traits (36 months).
Results: Successful EC at 15 months was associated with lower levels of BI at 24 months and both lower levels of BI and higher levels of EC at 24 months were related to less anxiety as well as ASD traits at 36 months (Figure 1). Exploratory mediation analyses also showed that BI was more strongly associated with anxiety whereas EC more strongly related to ASD symptoms.
Conclusions: The findings suggest that BI may be an early predictor of later anxiety in children at high and low risk of ASD, and that lower levels of EC in children who later develop ASD may contribute to the higher expression of anxiety within this population.
