title: Assessment of Autistic Traits in Children Aged 2 to 4½ Years With the Preschool Version of the Social Responsiveness Scale (SRS-P): Findings from Japan.
abstract: The recent development and use of autism measures for the general population has led to a growing body of evidence which suggests that autistic traits are distributed along a continuum. However, as most existing autism measures were designed for use in children older than age 4, to date, little is known about the autistic continuum in children younger than age 4. As autistic symptoms are evident in the first few years, to address this research gap, the current study tested the preschool version of the Social Responsiveness Scale (SRS-P) in children aged 2 to 4½ years in clinical (N = 74, average age 40 months, 26-51 months) and community settings (N = 357, average age 39 months, 25-50 months) in Japan. Using information obtained from different raters (mothers, other caregivers, and teachers) it was found that the scale demonstrated a good degree of internal consistency, inter-rater reliability and test-retest reliability, and a satisfactory degree of convergent validity for the clinical sample when compared with scores from diagnostic "gold standard" autism measures. Receiver operating characteristic analyses and the group comparisons also showed that the SRS-P total score discriminated well between children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and those without ASD. Importantly, this scale could identify autistic symptoms or traits distributed continually across the child population at this age irrespective of the presence of an ASD diagnosis. These findings suggest that the SRS-P might be a sensitive instrument for case identification including subthreshold ASD, as well as a potentially useful research tool for exploring ASD endophenotypes. Autism Res 2017, 10: 852-865. © 2017 International Society for Autism Research, Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
authors.affiliation: Department of Child and Adolescent Mental Health, National Institute of Mental Health, National Center of Neurology and Psychiatry (NCNP), Kodaira, Tokyo, Japan.|Department of Human Ecology, Graduate School of Medicine, University of Tokyo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo, Japan.|Stockholm Centre for Health and Social Change (SCOHOST), Södertörn University, Huddinge, Sweden.
authors.forename: Andrew
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Stickley
authors.affiliation: Division of Infant and Toddler Mental Health, Department of Psychosocial Medicine, National Medical Centre for Children and Mothers, Setagaya-ku, Tokyo, Japan.
authors.forename: Yoshiyuki
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Tachibana
authors.affiliation: Division of Rehabilitation Medicine and Developmental Evaluation Centre, National Centre for Child Health and Development (NCCHD), Setagaya-ku, Tokyo, Japan.
authors.forename: Keiji
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Hashimoto
authors.affiliation: Department of Child and Adolescent Mental Health, National Institute of Mental Health, National Center of Neurology and Psychiatry (NCNP), Kodaira, Tokyo, Japan.
authors.forename: Hideyuki
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Haraguchi
authors.affiliation: Department of Child and Adolescent Mental Health, National Institute of Mental Health, National Center of Neurology and Psychiatry (NCNP), Kodaira, Tokyo, Japan.
authors.forename: Atsuko
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Miyake
authors.affiliation: Research Center for Environment and Developmental Medical Sciences, Kyushu University, Fukuoka, Japan.
authors.forename: Seiichi
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Morokuma
authors.affiliation: National Centre for the Japan Environment and Children's Study, National Institute for Environmental Studies, Tsukuba, Ibaraki, Japan.
authors.forename: Hiroshi
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Nitta
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Life Science, Kumamoto University, Kumamoto, Japan.
authors.forename: Masako
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Oda
authors.affiliation: Division of Allergy, Department of Medical Sciences, National Center for Child Health and Development (NCCHD), Setagaya-ku, Tokyo, Japan.
authors.forename: Yukihiro
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Ohya
authors.affiliation: Japan Environment and Children's Study UOEH Subunit Center, University of Occupational and Environmental Health, Fukuoka, Japan.
authors.forename: Ayako
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Senju
authors.affiliation: Department of Child and Adolescent Mental Health, National Institute of Mental Health, National Center of Neurology and Psychiatry (NCNP), Kodaira, Tokyo, Japan.
authors.forename: Hidetoshi
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Takahashi
authors.affiliation: Department of Pediatrics, Jichi Medical University, Tochigi, Japan.
authors.forename: Takanori
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Yamagata
authors.affiliation: Department of Child and Adolescent Mental Health, National Institute of Mental Health, National Center of Neurology and Psychiatry (NCNP), Kodaira, Tokyo, Japan.
authors.forename: Yoko
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Kamio
mesh_terms: D000067877:Autism Spectrum Disorder / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000523:psychology*; D017028:Caregivers; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007564:Japan; D008297:Male; D009035:Mothers; D011594:Psychometrics; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D000070777:School Teachers; D012919:Social Behavior; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires / Q000592:standards*
keywords: ASD; autistic traits; preschool children; quantitative measure; questionnaire; reliability; validity