Abstract
Age of first walking (AOW) is reported to be later in autism spectrum disorder (ASD) compared with typical development. However, the relationship between AOW and variations in ASD symptoms across different neurodevelopmental disorders is largely unknown. This study investigated AOW and its association with autism symptom severity in a large sample of children (N = 490, 23% females) clinically evaluated for suspected ASD, differentiated into ASD (n = 376) and non-ASD (n = 114) diagnoses. Children with ASD achieved independent walking significantly later than children with non-ASD diagnoses. AOW was significantly associated with ASD symptom severity, and females had a non-significant later AOW. The current findings suggest that in cases with delayed AOW, ASD should be considered as an actual differential diagnosis, perhaps particularly in girls.
Highlights
Neurodevelopmental disorders (NDD) affect 10–15% of children (Gillberg 2010; Boyle et al 2011), often presenting with early delay in one or more developmental domains
Contrary to our finding that Age for onset of independent walking (AOW) was associated with symptom severity, as measured by the Autism Diagnostic Interview-Revised (ADI-R) and Social Communication Questionnaire (SCQ), and previous reports of correlations between Social Responsiveness Scale (SRS) and motor skills (Hilton et al 2007, 2012), we found no significant association between AOW and SRS
But in line with previous reports (Bishop et al 2016; Arabameri and Sotoodeh 2015), we found that females with autistic symptoms are more liable to delayed walking compared with males
Summary
Neurodevelopmental disorders (NDD) affect 10–15% of children (Gillberg 2010; Boyle et al 2011), often presenting with early delay in one or more developmental domains. Motor performance is not part of the diagnostic criteria for ASD, motor deficits are common (Fournier et al 2010), have been recognized as an associated feature since the earliest descriptions of the phenotype (Asperger 1944; Kanner 1943), and suggested as a cardinal ASD characteristic (Fournier et al 2010; Staples et al 2012; Hilton et al 2012) Motor signs, such as the attainment of motor milestones, may be more and reliably observed than core ASD symptoms. Emerging research has documented differences between ASD and typically developing infants, with higher rates of parent reported concerns about motor development and later attainment of motor skills, including walking among children with ASD (West 2018) This is available in Norway, where the use of both national and regional data (Storvold et al 2013), as well as comparisons with other countries (Onis 2006b) are considered to increase the external validity and generalizability of the results
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