Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2022

DOI

10.3389/fpsyg.2022.936392

Publication Title

Frontiers in Psychology

Pages

1-14 pp.

Abstract

Delays in early language development are characteristic of young autistic children, and one of the most recognizable first concerns that motivate parents to seek a diagnostic evaluation for their child. Although early language abilities are one of the strongest predictors of long-term outcomes, there is still much to be understood about the role of language impairment in the heterogeneous phenotypic presentation of autism. Using a personcentered, Latent Profile Analysis, we first aimed to identify distinct patterns of language and social communication ability in a clinic-based sample of 498 autistic children, ranging in age from 18 to 60 months (M = 33 mo, SD = 12 mo). Next, a multinomial logistic regression analysis was implemented to examine sociodemographic and child-based developmental differences among the identified language and social communication profiles. Three clinically meaningful profiles were identified from parent-rated and clinician-administered measures: Profile 1 (48% of the sample) “Relatively Low Language and Social Communication Abilities,” Profile 2 (34% of the sample) “Relatively Elevated Language and Social Communication Abilities,” and Profile 3 (18% of the sample) “Informant Discrepant Language and Relatively Elevated Social Communication Abilities.” Overall, young autistic children from the lowest-resource households exhibited the lowest language and social communication abilities, and the lowest non-verbal problem-solving and fine-motor skills, along with more features of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder and atypical auditory processing. These findings highlight the need for effective community-based implementation strategies for young autistic children from low-resource households and underrepresented communities to improve access to individualized quality care.

Rights

© 2022 Reetzke, Singh, Hong, Holingue, Kalb, Ludwig, Menon, Pfeiffer and Landa.

This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

Data Availability

Article states: The original contributions presented in this study are included in the article/supplementary material, further inquiries can be directed to the corresponding author.

ORCID

0000-0003-1080-4961 (Pfeiffer)

Original Publication Citation

Reetzke, R., Singh, V., Hong, J. S., Holingue, C. B., Kalb, L. G., Ludwig, N. N., Menon, D., Pfeiffer, D. L., & Landa, R. J. (2022). Profiles and correlates of language and social communication differences among young autistic children [Original Research]. Frontiers in Psychology,13. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2022.936392

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