Adaptive Behavior and Autism Spectrum Disorders: Differential Analysis of Demands and Needs With Neurotypical People

Abstract

The presence of adaptive behaviors in people with Autism Spectrum Disorder are usually frequent. Generally, they are confused with the same disorders but, in reality, they occur as dysfunctional communications as a result of a lack of understanding in the environments and daily realities of these people, which explains many of their demands and needs. In recent years, there has been a growing interest in the conceptualization and evaluation of adaptive behavior, as well as attention to behavioral disorders, increasingly evident in educational and experiential environments. This new situation greatly affects children with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD), so the educational community (and society in general) must offer responses to these needs and demands of both children ASD as well as those of their peers instead of creating warning signs and relating these difficulties to characteristics determined by the disorder itself. There are many families and education professionals who manifest their lack of training and knowledge about the needs and demands of these people, which greatly hinders their full inclusion in their education and life, generating frame works of co-existence that are difficult to accept for some and other people. Methods: A quasi-experimental study, with a retrospective cross-sectional design, is carried out by analyzing 209 subjects from Galicia (n=111 subjects with ASD and n=98 neurotypicals) to whom the ICAP Adaptive Behavior assessment test was applied between 2016 and 2021. Results: The skills of the participating subjects, evaluated through the ICAP, indicate risk factors in the regression analysis insofar as it affects the four dimensions evaluated between the two samples of people with ASD and without ASD. The identified risk factors are related to young age (OR=2.27, 95% CI=1.30-3.96) and being male (OR=2.67, 95% CI=1.41-4.68) relating them to the development of motor skills (OR=2.34, 95% CI=1.07-5.11), social and communication skills (OR=14.70, 95% CI=5.73-37.7), personal life skills (OR=3.93, 95% CI=1.73-8.92) and community living skills (OR=9.87, 95% CI=3.99-24.42). Conclusions: It is evident that disorders affect the development of adaptive behavior, it is not a matter of observing this relationship today, but it is about determining the needs and demands for support, being rigorous and making the right decisions for its development in the best way Possible. In this study, the impact on the development of communication and social skills of this disorder