Sensory atypicalities in dyads of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and their parents.
Sensory quirks run in autism families, so screen parents too and write plans that help both generations.
01Research in Context
What this study did
The team asked parents and kids with autism to fill out the same sensory checklist.
They compared the answers to see if the child’s scores matched the parent’s scores.
Neurotypical families also took the test to give a baseline.
What they found
Parents of children with autism scored high on sensory quirks, just like their kids.
The parent-child match was strong in autism families and weak in typical families.
This hints that sensory issues travel in families.
How this fits with other research
Neufeld et al. (2021) used twins and found the same family link, but showed the link only matters for sensation seeking, not for every sensory problem.
Madden et al. (2003) first showed toddlers with autism have more sensory symptoms; Magdalena et al. now show the pattern stays in the parents.
Dellapiazza et al. (2020) report that almost every child with autism has sensory issues; together the papers say: check the whole family, then watch how sensory style shapes daily skills.
Why it matters
If the parent also avoids loud malls or tags in shirts, the child’s “bad behavior” may be shared biology, not non-compliance.
Add a quick sensory checklist for caregivers during intake.
When both parent and child score high, build plans that reduce sensory load for everyone—dim lights, allow headphones, schedule quiet breaks.
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Join Free →Hand the Short Sensory Profile to the caregiver at intake and compare it with the child’s scores—note matching highs and pick one shared trigger to reduce first.
02At a glance
03Original abstract
Sensory atypicalities are a common feature of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). To date, the relationship between sensory atypicalities in dyads of children with ASD and their parents has not been investigated. Exploring these relationships can contribute to an understanding of how phenotypic profiles may be inherited, and the extent to which familial factors might contribute towards children's sensory profiles and constitute an aspect of the broader autism phenotype (BAP). Parents of 44 children with ASD and 30 typically developing (TD) children, aged between 3 and 14 years, participated. Information about children's sensory experiences was collected through parent report using the Sensory Profile questionnaire. Information about parental sensory experiences was collected via self-report using the Adolescent/Adult Sensory Profile. Parents of children with ASD had significantly higher scores than parents of TD children in relation to low registration, over responsivity, and taste/smell sensory processing. Similar levels of agreement were obtained within ASD and TD parent-child dyads on a number of sensory atypicalities; nevertheless significant correlations were found between parents and children in ASD families but not TD dyads for sensation avoiding and auditory, visual, and vestibular sensory processing. The findings suggest that there are similarities in sensory processing profiles between parents and their children in both ASD and TD dyads. Familial sensory processing factors are likely to contribute towards the BAP. Further work is needed to explore genetic and environmental influences on the developmental pathways of the sensory atypicalities in ASD. Autism Res 2017, 10: 531-538. © 2016 International Society for Autism Research, Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Autism research : official journal of the International Society for Autism Research, 2017 · doi:10.1002/aur.1680