Brief Report: Replication and Validation of the Brief Autism Detection in Early Childhood (BADEC) in a Clinical Sample.

The team tested the 5-question BADEC screener on the toddlers under age three. All families were already waiting for an autism evaluation at a hospital clinic.

Each toddler also received the full ADOS so the researchers could check if BADEC’s short answers matched the long gold-standard result.

BADEC caught almost every toddler who later received an ASD diagnosis on the ADOS. Only five items, zero extra tools, and it took under three minutes.

The short screener kept false alarms low, so fewer worried parents needed unnecessary referrals.

Sievers et al. (2020) built a similar quick flag for adults using the PAI personality test. Together the papers show fast screens can work at both ends of the age span.

Waldron et al. (2023) mined electronic health records with an NLP tool to spot autistic young adults. BADEC does the same “find them early” job, but for toddlers in person rather than adults on a computer.

Osório et al. (2025) found autistic toddlers walk with shaky, uneven steps. Their motor sign is another early clue, so you could pair BADEC with a simple gait check for richer data without lengthening intake.

You now have a 5-question script that spots likely ASD before age three. Use it during first clinic visits, waiting rooms, or daycare screenings. A quick “yes” on any item fast-tracks families to full evaluation, shaving weeks off waitlists and starting therapy sooner.