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Examining bidirectional effects between the autism spectrum disorder ( ASD ) core symptom domains and anxiety in children with ASD
Author(s) -
Duvekot Jorieke,
Ende Jan,
Verhulst Frank C.,
GreavesLord Kirstin
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
journal of child psychology and psychiatry
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.652
H-Index - 211
eISSN - 1469-7610
pISSN - 0021-9630
DOI - 10.1111/jcpp.12829
Subject(s) - anxiety , psychology , autism spectrum disorder , autism , social communication , social anxiety , clinical psychology , developmental psychology , psychiatry
Background Although a bidirectional relationship between autism spectrum disorder ( ASD ) and anxiety symptoms is assumed, few studies have investigated this. Moreover, little is known about potential differential relationships of the two core symptom domains of ASD – social communication impairment and restricted, repetitive behavior – with anxiety over time. Method Participants were 130 children with an ASD ( M age 6.7 years, 81.5% boys) of whom 79 participated in a follow‐up assessment 2 years later. We used cross‐lagged models to test whether social communication impairment and restricted, repetitive behavior at T0 predicted anxiety at T2 and vice versa. Results Crossed‐lagged models showed that anxiety symptoms predicted social communication impairment over time (β = .22, p = .008), but not vice versa (β = −.07, p = .49). There were no significant paths from anxiety symptoms to later restricted, repetitive behavior (β = .11, p = .34) or vice versa (β = −.11, p = .27). Conclusions Our results do not support a bidirectional relationship between the ASD core symptom domains and anxiety, but suggest that higher levels of anxiety symptoms increase the risk of more social communication impairment over time in children with ASD. This underlines the importance of treating anxiety symptoms to improve both social and emotional functioning.