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Research

Co-occurring Neurodevelopmental Conditions in Children: Advocating for Transdiagnostic Approach to Assessments

Approximately 8% of all children experience developmental and mental health conditions. Similarities in characteristics across neurodevelopmental conditions-such as difficulties in communication and language, social interaction, motor coordination, attention, activity regulation, behavior, mood, and sleep-make it challenging to attribute these characteristics exclusively to specific diagnoses and assessments. The purpose of this study was to identify symptomatic domains across neurodevelopmental conditions in children and to explore dimension reduction for transdiagnostic assessment. 

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Characterizing the Nature of Alexithymia in Autistic Adults: Validation of the Perth Alexithymia Questionnaire

Alexithymia—a trait characterized by difficulties in emotion processing—is of high interest in the autism field. However, the lack of validated alexithymia measures for autistic individuals limits progress. This study aimed to address this gap by examining the psychometric properties of the Perth Alexithymia Questionnaire (PAQ) across autistic and non-autistic samples. Using the PAQ, we investigated how alexithymia manifests in autistic individuals and its links with poor mental health outcomes (anxiety).

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Vitamin D is crucial for maternal care and offspring social behaviour in rats

These data highlight that early life levels of vitamin D are an important consideration for maternal behavioural adaptations as well as offspring neuropsychiatry

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Do hypertensive diseases of pregnancy disrupt neurocognitive development in offspring?

The current study sought to determine whether gestational hypertension and pre-eclampsia are associated with neurocognitive outcomes in middle childhood.

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The effect of functioning on Quality of Life Inventory-Disability measured quality of life is not mediated or moderated by parental psychological distress

The measurement of quality of life (QOL) in children with intellectual disability often relies upon proxy report via caregivers. The current study investigated whether caregiver psychological distress mediates or moderates the effects of impairment on their ratings of QOL in children with intellectual disability.

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Genetic counseling as preventive intervention: toward individual specification of transgenerational autism risk

Although autism spectrum disorders (ASD) are among the most heritable of all neuropsychiatric syndromes, most affected children are born to unaffected parents. Recently, we reported an average increase of 3-5% over general population risk of ASD among offspring of adults who have first-degree relatives with ASD in a large epidemiologic family sample.

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Autism-related dietary preferences mediate autism-gut microbiome associations

There is increasing interest in the potential contribution of the gut microbiome to autism spectrum disorder (ASD). However, previous studies have been underpowered and have not been designed to address potential confounding factors in a comprehensive way.

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First Impressions Towards Autistic People: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Emerging evidence suggests that observers tend to form less favorable first impressions toward autistic people than toward non-autistic people. These negative impressions may be associated with immediate behavioral responses, as well as long-lasting attitudes toward those being observed that may negatively impact their psychosocial wellbeing. 

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A preliminary study of fetal head circumference growth in Autism Spectrum Disorder

Fetal head circumference (HC) growth was examined prospectively in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD).

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Where were those rabbits? A new paradigm to determine cerebral lateralisation of visuospatial memory function in children

In this study we devised a child-friendly version of a paradigm to assess lateralisation of visuospatial memory using functional transcranial Doppler...