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Clinical Trial
. 2017 Jul 25:8:37.
doi: 10.1186/s13229-017-0153-9. eCollection 2017.

ADHD-related symptoms and attention profiles in the unaffected siblings of probands with autism spectrum disorder: focus on the subtypes of autism and Asperger's disorder

Yi-Ling Chien  1   2 , Miao-Chun Chou  3 , Yen-Nan Chiu  1 , Wen-Jiun Chou  3 , Yu-Yu Wu  4 , Wen-Che Tsai  1 , Susan Shur-Fen Gau  1   2
Affiliations
Clinical Trial

ADHD-related symptoms and attention profiles in the unaffected siblings of probands with autism spectrum disorder: focus on the subtypes of autism and Asperger's disorder

Yi-Ling Chien et al. Mol Autism. .

Abstract

Background: The presence of attention-deficit/hyperactive disorder (ADHD) symptoms and impaired attention performance are commonly noted in individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). However, little is known about attention performance in their unaffected siblings. This study aimed to investigate the ADHD-related traits and attention performance in unaffected siblings of probands with autism and Asperger syndrome (AS), as well as the clinical correlates of ADHD-related traits.

Methods: We assessed the intention, hyperactivity-impulsivity, and oppositional symptoms, and attention profiles of 199 probands with a diagnosis of ASD (122 autism, 77 AS), their unaffected siblings, and 196 typically developing controls (TD) by their parents' reports on the ADHD-related symptoms and the Connors' Continuous Performance Test (CCPT), respectively.

Results: Compared to TD, unaffected siblings of ASD probands were more hyperactive/impulsive and oppositional, particularly unaffected siblings of AS probands. In CCPT, unaffected siblings of AS have intermediate levels of performance between probands with AS and TD on focused attention and sustained attention but were not statistically different from AS probands or TD in these attention profiles. In contrast, unaffected siblings of autism probands have significantly better CCPT performance when compared to autism probands but not to TD. In addition, stereotyped behaviors predicted ADHD-related traits in both sibling groups, but distinctive patterns of other correlates for ADHD-related traits were found between the two sibling groups.

Conclusions: This work suggested that unaffected siblings of AS, but not autism, have more hyperactive/impulsive traits and a trend of pervasive attention deficits assessed by CCPT which might serve as potential endophenotypes for genetic studies in AS.

Trial registration: ClinicalTrials.gov, NCT01582256.

Keywords: Attention; Autism spectrum disorder; Continuous performance test; Endophenotype; Sibling.

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Conflict of interest statement

Ethics approval and consent to participate

This study has been performed in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki. The Research Ethics Committee of National Taiwan University Hospital approved this study before implementation. All the participants gave assent, and their parents gave written informed consent for their children, using the approved consent forms.

Consent for publication

Not applicable.

Competing interests

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

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Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

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