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Brief Report: Longitudinal Trajectory of Working Memory in School-Aged Children on the Autism Spectrum: Period of High Plasticity and “Late Bloomers”

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Abstract

Purpose

While working memory (WM) is a powerful predictor for children’s school outcomes, autistic children are more likely to experience delays. This study compared autistic children and their neurotypical peers’ WM development over their elementary school years, including relative growth and period of plasticity.

Methods

Using a nationally-representative dataset, latent growth models were built to examine periods of high plasticity and the relationship between children’s performance upon school entry and their relative growth.

Results

While both groups made steeper gains during the early school years, autistic children’s period of highest plasticity was prolonged by 1 year, which suggests a larger window for interventions. Further, autistic children who started kindergarten with poorer WM were more likely to make rapid growth during the last 3 years of elementary school, which is when their neurotypical peers’ development started to plateau.

Conclusion

Findings should prompt various stakeholders to examine interventions and instructions to maximize autistic children’s growth in WM. Further, the continued support and monitoring by educators throughout autistic children’s late childhood can be particularly beneficial for the “late-bloomers.”

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Notes

  1. See Appendix Table 6.

  2. Both autism group and NT group passed Little’s MCAR test with \({}^{2}\)=133.860 (p = 0.584) and \({}^{2}\)=140.767 (p = 0.106) respectively.

  3. Stanovich (1986) termed the Matthew Effect, which states that those who have more academic ability show a greater ratio of growth compared to those who are at a disadvantage in academic ability.

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Acknowledgments

This project was supported in part by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) under cooperative agreement UT3MC39436, Autism Intervention Research Network on Behavioral Health (AIR-B). The information, content and/or conclusions are those of the author and should not be construed as the official position or policy of, nor should any endorsements be inferred by HRSA, HHS or the U.S. Government.

Funding

This study was funded by Health Resources and Services Administration, UT3MC39436, Connie Kasari.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Education, University of California, Los Angeles, Moore Hall, 457 Portola Plaza, Los Angeles, CA, 90095, USA

    Sohyun An Kim & Connie Kasari

  2. Semel Institute for Neuroscience, University of California, Los Angeles, CA, USA

    Connie Kasari

Authors
  1. Sohyun An Kim
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  2. Connie Kasari
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Contributions

Sohyun An Kim devised the project and secured access to the dataset. Sohyun An Kim designed the study, performed the statistical analysis, and drafted the manuscript. Connie Kasari supervised the entire process from the inception of the study, provided critical feedback, and helped shape the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Sohyun An Kim.

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In order to respect the preference of many autistic self-advocates, ‘person-first language’ and ‘identity-first language’ were used interchangeably throughout this paper.

Appendix

Appendix

See Table 6

Table 6 Sample sizes of previous studies examining working memory of autistic children
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Kim, S.A., Kasari, C. Brief Report: Longitudinal Trajectory of Working Memory in School-Aged Children on the Autism Spectrum: Period of High Plasticity and “Late Bloomers”. J Autism Dev Disord (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-023-05960-5

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