Unlocking the Potential of Autism Detection: Integrating Traditional Feature Selection and Machine Learning Techniques

Abstract

The diagnostic process for Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) typically involves time-consuming assessments conducted by specialized physicians. To improve the efficiency of ASD screening, intelligent solutions based on machine learning have been proposed in the literature. However, many existing ML models lack the incorporation of medical tests and demographic features, which could potentially enhance their detection capabilities by considering affected features through traditional feature selection approaches. This study aims to address the aforementioned limitation by utilizing a real dataset containing 45 features and 983 patients. To achieve this goal, a two-phase methodology is employed. The first phase involves data preparation, including handling missing data through model-based imputation, normalizing the dataset using the Min-Max method, and selecting relevant features using traditional feature selection approaches based on affected features. In the second phase, seven ML classification techniques recommended by the literature, including Decision Trees (DT), Random Forest (RF), K-Nearest Neighbors (KNN), Support Vector Machine (SVM), AdaBoost, Gradient Boosting (GB), and Neural Network (NN), are utilized to develop ML models. These models are then trained and tested on the prepared dataset to evaluate their performance in detecting ASD. The performance of the ML models is assessed using various metrics, such as Accuracy, Recall, Precision, F1-score, AUC, Train time, and Test time. These metrics provide insights into the models' overall accuracy, sensitivity, specificity, and the trade-off between true positive and false positive rates. The results of the study highlight the effectiveness of utilizing traditional feature selection approaches based on affected features. Specifically, the GB model outperforms the other models with an accuracy of 87%, Recall of 87%, Precision of 86%, F1-score of 86%, AUC of 95%, Train time of 21.890, and Test time of 0.173. Additionally, a benchmarking analysis against five other studies reveals that the proposed methodology achieves a perfect score across three key areas. By considering affected features through traditional feature selection approaches, the developed ML models demonstrate improved performance and have the potential to enhance ASD screening and diagnosis processes.