The developmental trajectory of parent-report and objective sleep profiles in autism spectrum disorder: Associations with anxiety and bedtime routines.

Morrison et al. (2017) tracked sleep for one year in autistic and neurotypical children. Parents filled out sleep logs and kids wore actigraphy watches. The team also measured anxiety and bedtime routines.

The study had no control group. It simply watched the same children twice, one year apart.

Parents of autistic kids reported fewer sleep problems at the second visit. Their ratings moved in step with lower anxiety scores.

The watches told a different story. Total sleep time dropped in both groups. Autistic children also showed more night-to-night swings in sleep length and quality.

Tse et al. (2020) extends these findings. Their single-time-point study shows autistic kids sleep worse across every objective measure. E et al. adds the time lens: the gap stays, but parents notice it less as anxiety falls.

Waddington et al. (2020) widens the picture. They found seizures, maternal anxiety, low income, and autism severity all predict sleep disturbance. E et al. narrows the focus to anxiety alone and tracks it year-to-year.

Taylor et al. (2017) looks methodologically similar. Both studies followed autistic youth for about one year with no control group. J et al. saw stable anxiety scores, while E et al. saw anxiety drop. The difference may lie in the sample: J et al. mixed ages; E et al. focused on late elementary and middle-school kids where anxiety interventions often work better.

Actigraphy does not lie. Even when parents report better sleep, autistic children may still lose minutes each night and bounce between good and bad nights. Track both parent mood and watch data before you fade a sleep intervention. If anxiety drops but actigraphy looks worse, keep the sleep plan active and add nightly variability as its own target.