title: Increased Sensory Processing Atypicalities in Parents of Multiplex ASD Families Versus Typically Developing and Simplex ASD Families.
abstract: Recent studies have suggested that sensory processing atypicalities may share genetic influences with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). To further investigate this, the adolescent/adult sensory profile (AASP) questionnaire was distributed to 85 parents of typically developing children (P-TD), 121 parents from simplex ASD families (SPX), and 54 parents from multiplex ASD families (MPX). After controlling for gender and presence of mental disorders, results showed that MPX parents significantly differed from P-TD parents in all four subscales of the AASP. Differences between SPX and MPX parents reached significance in the Sensory Sensitivity subscale and also in subsequent modality-specific analyses in the auditory and visual domains. Our finding that parents with high genetic liability for ASD (i.e., MPX) had more sensory processing atypicalities than parents with low (i.e., SPX) or no (i.e., P-TD) ASD genetic liability suggests that sensory processing atypicalities may contribute to the genetic susceptibility for ASD.
authors.affiliation: Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands. Chelsea.Donaldson@fulbrightmail.org.
authors.forename: Chelsea K
authors.initials: CK
authors.lastname: Donaldson
authors.affiliation: Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Johannes E A
authors.initials: JEA
authors.lastname: Stauder
authors.affiliation: Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands.|Department of Psychiatry, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, USA.
authors.forename: Franc C L
authors.initials: FCL
authors.lastname: Donkers
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000067877:Autism Spectrum Disorder / Q000523:psychology*; D002648:Child; D003071:Cognition; D005260:Female; D020022:Genetic Predisposition to Disease; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010290:Parents / Q000523:psychology*; D012677:Sensation; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Autism spectrum disorder; Broader autism phenotype; Hypersensitivity; Hyposensitivity; Multiplex; Sensory processing; Simplex