Although there is evidence that significant sleep problems are common in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and that poor sleep exacerbates problematic daytime behavior, such relationships have received very little attention in both research and clinical practice. Treatment guidelines to help manage challenging behaviors in ASD fail to mention sleep at all, or they present a very limited account. Moreover, limited attention is given to children with low-functioning autism, those individuals who often experience the most severe sleep disruption and behavioral problems. This paper describes the nature of sleep difficulties in ASD and highlights the complexities of sleep disruption in individuals with low-functioning autism. It is proposed that profiling ASD children based on the nature of their sleep disruption might help to understand symptom and behavioral profiles (or vice versa) and therefore lead to better-targeted interventions. This paper concludes with a discussion of the limitations of current knowledge and proposes areas that are important for future research. Treating disordered sleep in ASD has great potential to improve daytime behavior and family functioning in this vulnerable population.

An antagonist for the metabotropic glutamate receptor may improve symptoms in patients with fragile X syndrome whose FMR1 promoters are fully methylated.

Background: This paper aimed to review the literature on the factors associated with parenting stress and resilience among parents of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) in the South East Asia (SEA) region. Methods: An extensive search of articles in multiple online databases (PsycNET, ProQuest, PudMed, EMBASE, CINAHL, Web of Science, and Google Scholar) resulted in 28 papers that met the inclusion criteria (i.e., conducted in the SEA region, specific to ASD only, published in a peer-reviewed journal, full text in English). Studies found were conducted in the following countries: Brunei, n = 1; Indonesia, n = 2; Malaysia, n = 12; Philippines, n = 5; Singapore, n = 5, Thailand, n = 2; and Vietnam, n = 1, but none from Cambodia, East Timor, Laos, and Myanmar were identified. Results: Across the studies, six main factors were found to be associated with parenting stress: social support, severity of autism symptoms, financial difficulty, parents' perception and understanding toward ASD, parents' anxiety and worries about their child's future, and religious beliefs. These six factors could also be categorized as either a source of parenting stress or a coping strategy/resilience mechanism that may attenuate parenting stress. Conclusion: The findings suggest that greater support services in Western countries may underlie the cultural differences observed in the SEA region. Limitations in the current review were identified. The limited number of studies yielded from the search suggests a need for expanded research on ASD and parenting stress, coping, and resilience in the SEA region especially in Cambodia, East Timor, Laos, and Myanmar. The identified stress and resilience factors may serve as sociocultural markers for clinicians, psychologists, and other professionals to consider when supporting parents of children with ASD.

Association between attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and the 10-repeat allele of the dopamine transporter gene (DAT1) has been reported in independent clinical samples using a categorical clinical definition of ADHD. The present study adopts a quantitative trait loci (QTL) approach to examine the association between DAT1 and a continuous measure of ADHD behaviours in a general-population sample, as well as to explore whether there is an independent association between DAT1 and performance on neuropsychological tests of attention, response inhibition, and working memory. From an epidemiological sample of 872 boys aged 6–11 years, we recruited 58 boys scoring above the 90th percentile for teacher reported ADHD symptoms (SWAN ADHD scale) and 68 boys scoring below 10th percentile for genotyping and neuropsychological testing. A significant association was found between the DAT1 homozygous 10/10-repeat genotype and high-scoring boys (χ²square=4.6, P<0.03; odds ratio=2.4, 95% CI 1.1–5.0). Using hierarchical linear regression, a significant independent association was found between the DAT1 10/10-repeat genotype and measures of selective attention and response inhibition after adjusting for age, IQ, and ADHD symptoms. There was no association between DAT1 and any component of working memory. Furthermore, performance on tasks of selective attention although associated with DAT1 was not associated with SWAN ADHD high scores after controlling for age and IQ. In contrast, impairment on tasks that tapped sustained attention and the central executive component of working memory were found in high-scoring boys after adjusting for age and IQ. The results suggest that DAT1 is a QTL for continuously distributed ADHD behaviours in the general population and the cognitive endophenotype of response inhibition.