[Investigation of the behavioural phenotype of parents of autistic children through the new FAQ self-report]

Abstract

Introduction: Autism is characterized by impairments in communication and socialization and by the presence of circumscribed and stereotyped interest. Previous studies have shown that genetic mechanisms may enhance the vulnerability to autism. These mechanisms are complex and may involve the combination of several genes, in interaction with the environment. The genetic mechanism involved in the vulnerability to autism may also concern other disorders and some features, with enhanced prevalence in relatives of autistic patients. It has been shown, for example, that the frequency of language disorders or serial difficulties is increased in the siblings of autistic patients. Characterization and taking into account the presence of such phenotypic traits in the relations may help in understanding the results of genetic studies, in particular association studies in sibling pairs or trios.

Objective: In this study, we used a new self-report in order to identify endophenotype traits in socialization, communication, rigidity and imagination in parents of autistic children. This self-report is the French adaptation of the previous self-report created by Baron-Cohen et al., aimed at the identification of Asperger profiles in a population of students studying science.

Methodology: Ten autistic children and their parents from a clinical setting were asked to participate in the study. Autistic children were characterized using the ADI-R and various psychometric tests, according to the possibilities of the child (PEP-R, WPPSI-R, WISC3). Twenty parents of normal children were recruited from three different professional settings. There were no differences between the two groups of parents in terms of age or social status. Parents of both groups were asked to fill in the FAQ self-report.

Results: We performed a post-hoc analysis comparing the scores of the parents in the two groups. We found a main group, but no sex effect [F (1,37)=5.46; p<0.05]. Scores of autistic parents were higher in all domains compared to the control parents (p<0.05). However, the score on the socialization subscale was the only one that significantly differed from the scores on the imagination, language and rigidity subscales [F (3,111)=20.75, p<0.001].

Conclusion: Our results show significant differences between the two groups of parents in the socialization domain. This is of interest both for the interpretation of the presence of allelic variants in the genetic association studies, and for the understanding of the interplay between genotype and phenotype in the development of the autistic disorder.