Social support and links to quality of life among middle-aged and older autistic adults.

Abstract

Social support can take many forms, such as practical help, time spent socially with others, or the satisfaction with personal relationships. Social support is known to affect quality of life (QoL) in both non-autistic older and autistic young adults. QoL reflects how satisfied an individual is with their life either overall or in a certain area. We know little about middle-aged and older autistic adults' experiences of social support or QoL. In this study, 388 adults aged 40-83 years old, completed online questionnaires asking about background such as age and sex, depression and anxiety symptoms, QoL (physical, psychological, social, environmental, and autism-specific), and different types of social support. Even after taking into account background, depression, and anxiety, social support was important for individuals' QoL. To our knowledge this is the first paper to examine the relationship between social support and QoL in middle-aged and older autistic adults. Improving social support may have a significant impact on the QoL of older autistic adults. Future studies should examine whether age-related changes in social support (size, content, and arrangement of social networks) that are common in non-autistic aging, also occur among older autistic adults.