Autism severity level affects working memory and planning but not inhibition, shifting and emotional control.
Autism severity mainly drags down planning and working memory in young kids, so zero-in on those two skills first.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Haris and team looked at 60 autistic kids . They split the group by autism severity: low, medium, high. Each child took the BRIEF-P, a teacher checklist that rates five executive functions. The study asked: does severity predict weaker scores?
What they found
Planning and working memory got worse as severity rose. Inhibition, shifting, and emotional control stayed flat across all levels. In short, only two skills felt the weight of more severe autism.
How this fits with other research
Leung et al. (2014) saw that semantic hints helped typical kids remember visual patterns but did nothing for autistic kids. Their result warned us that working memory in ASD is already fragile; Haris now shows the fragility grows with severity.
Sasson et al. (2018) looked at neurotypical 8-young learners with high autistic traits and found better visual working memory, not worse. That seems like a clash, but the kids were not diagnosed and were older. The contradiction fades once you see the groups differ.
Eussen et al. (2016) used network maps and found planning acts as a strong hub in autistic brains. Haris echoes this by showing planning is one of the few skills that tracks severity, giving teachers a clear target.
Why it matters
If you write plans for preschool or kindergarten students with ASD, lead with planning and working-memory goals. These skills dip first as severity rises, so early practice here may protect later learning. Skip extra drills on inhibition or emotional control unless a separate assessment flags them.
Want CEUs on This Topic?
The ABA Clubhouse has 60+ free CEUs — live every Wednesday. Ethics, supervision & clinical topics.
Join Free →Add one planning game, like three-step Lego copying, to your session and record how many steps the child holds without prompts.
02At a glance
03Original abstract
Autistic children often have difficulties in executive functions (EF). These difficulties can, in turn, affect their everyday functioning. It is less clear in what way EF are affected by the severity of autism symptoms in children. We hypothesize that autism severity level does not have the same effect across the different components of EF. In this study, we examined how EF are affected by the autism severity level in a sample of 52 autistic children aged 4-7 years (mean age- 5.4 years, SD- 0.9 years). EF were measured through teachers' reports on the Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Functions- Preschool Version. Autism severity level was measured with the Social Communication Questionnaire- Current Form. The results of this study showed that autism severity level impacted two EF, namely Planning and Working memory, and did not affect three EF components: Inhibition, Shifting, and Emotional Control. These results indicate that the cool or cognitive EF are more affected by autism severity level than hot EF. We conclude the article with suggestions for improving EF in autistic children.
Autism research : official journal of the International Society for Autism Research, 2023 · doi:10.1002/aur.2952