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Does Gender Moderate Core Deficits in ASD? An Investigation into Restricted and Repetitive Behaviors in Girls and Boys with ASD

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Abstract

Due to the uneven gender ratio of autism spectrum disorders (ASD), girls are rarely studied independently from boys. Research focusing on restricted and repetitive behaviors (RRBs) indicates that above the age of six girls have fewer and/or different RRBs than boys with ASD. In this study we investigated whether girls and boys with ASD demonstrated similar rates and types of RRBs in early childhood, using discrete observational coding from a video-taped play interaction. Twenty-nine girls with ASD were matched to 29 boys based on ASD severity. While boys in our sample demonstrated a greater frequency of RRBs, this was not significant and our findings indicate that girls and boys under five are more similar than dissimilar on this core deficit. However our data also revealed a trend toward gender-differential growth trajectories—a finding worthy of further investigation in larger samples.

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Acknowledgements

This research was funded by Autism Speaks, Health Resources and Services Administration (Maternal and Child Health Bureau) and National Institute of Health (National Institute of Child Health and Human Development). The opinions expressed represent those of the authors and do not represent the views of the funding bodies. Clare Harrop was at the Center for Autism Research and Treatment, University of California Los Angeles when the study was conducted. We thank the families who kindly participated in this research. Thank you to Wendy Shih for her assistance with data analysis. We also thank the graduate students and research assistants who collected and coded these data, in particular Lilit Hovsepyan.

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  1. Department of Allied Health Sciences, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Bondurant Hall, Suite 3093, 321 South Columbia Street, Chapel Hill, NC, 27514, USA

    Clare Harrop

  2. Center for Autism Research and Treatment, Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior, University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA, USA

    Amanda Gulsrud & Connie Kasari

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  1. Clare Harrop
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Correspondence to Clare Harrop.

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Harrop, C., Gulsrud, A. & Kasari, C. Does Gender Moderate Core Deficits in ASD? An Investigation into Restricted and Repetitive Behaviors in Girls and Boys with ASD. J Autism Dev Disord 45, 3644–3655 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-015-2511-9

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