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Research

“I Just Feel Like the Teacher Understood Me, and She Knew What I Needed”: School Experiences of Autistic Students from Diverse Backgrounds

Gathering Autistic young people's testimony is critical for understanding their lived experience of education and designing settings in which these students can thrive. Despite increasing knowledge in this field, we lack perspectives from a broad range of Autistic students which necessarily limits our ability to build inclusive, supportive environments for all. This study explored the educational experiences of preschool and school-aged Autistic students from diverse age groups, backgrounds, and educational settings.

Research

Parsing the heterogeneity of social motivation in autism

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.

Research

Few sex differences in regional gray matter volume growth trajectories across early childhood

Sex-specific developmental differences in brain structure have been documented in older children and adolescents, with females generally showing smaller overall brain volumes and earlier peak ages than males. However, sex differences in gray matter structural development in early childhood are less studied. We characterized sex-specific trajectories of gray matter volume development in children aged 2–8 years.  

Research

Autism Early Intervention Providers: Their Priorities, Use of Empirically Supported Practices, and Professional Development Needs

Autism early intervention research has indicated a research-to-practice gap, including continued use of practices with inadequate research support, and insufficient use of empirically supported practices. The present study explored the processes and mechanisms through which providers working with young children on the autism spectrum learn, select, and implement the various practices in their clinical repertoires. 

Research

Arcuate fasciculus and pre-reading language development in children with prenatal alcohol exposure

Prenatal alcohol exposure (PAE) contributes to widespread neurodevelopmental challenges, including reading, and has been associated with altered white matter. Here, we aimed to investigate whether arcuate fasciculus development is associated with pre-reading language skills in young children with PAE.

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Does cerebral lateralization develop? A study using functional transcranial Doppler ultrasound assessing

In the majority of people, language production is lateralized to the left cerebral hemisphere and visuospatial skills to the right.

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

In the majority of people, functional differences are observed between the two cerebral hemispheres: language production is typically subserved by the left...

Research

CNTNAP2 variants affect early language development in the general population

We tested the hypothesis that these CNTNAP2 variants affect communicative behavior, measured at 2 years of age in a large epidemiological sample...

Research

Inner speech impairment in children with autism is associated with greater nonverbal than verbal skills

We present a new analysis of Whitehouse, Maybery, and Durkin's (2006, Experiment 3) data on inner speech in children with autism (CWA).