Abstract
Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder with increasing prevalence, and a male-to-female ratio of 4:1. Research has been suggesting that discrepancy in prevalence may be due to the fact that females camouflage their symptoms. In this study, we aimed to systematically review evidence on the camouflage effect in females with ASD. Following the PRISMA guidelines, we reviewed empirical research published from January 2009 to September 2019 on PubMed, Web of Science, PsychInfo and Scopus databases. Thirteen empirical articles were included in this review. Overall, evidence supports that camouflaging seems to be an adaptive mechanism for females with ASD, despite the negative implications of these behaviours in their daily life.
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Acknowledgments
M.T.F. acknowledges Xunta de Galicia-GAIN for the Principia research grant. This work was supported by Fundación María José Jove. S.C. acknowledges Psychology for Positive Development Research Center (Grant No. PSI/04375), Universidade Lusíada – Norte, Porto, supported by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology through national funds (Grant No. UID/PSI/04375/2019).
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MTF and SC were responsible for the article search, data analysis, manuscript preparation, edited and reviewed the manuscript. AS was responsible for the manuscript preparation, edited and reviewed the manuscript. AC was responsible for funding acquisition and edited and reviewed the manuscript. MFP conceptualized the study, edited and reviewed the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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Tubío-Fungueiriño, M., Cruz, S., Sampaio, A. et al. Social Camouflaging in Females with Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Systematic Review. J Autism Dev Disord 51, 2190–2199 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-020-04695-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-020-04695-x