Journal of autism and childhood schizophrenia最新文献

The Michigan Gender Identity Test (MGIT) was administered to 52 retarded and 36 normal children to assess the acquisition of gender identity. This instrument required the ability to sort and categorize photographs of boys and girls wearing conventional clothing and with conventional hair-styles. As part of the test, each child was expected to recognize a self-photo and to be able to categorize it as a boy or a girl. In general, a significant correlation was found between MGIT performance and mental age for the retarded children. The performance of the normal children correlated significantly with both chronological age and mental age.

The clinical and biochemical status of thyroid function of patients with an autistic syndrome was investigated. The study consisted of 13 patients between the ages of 7 and 21 years. There was no clinical evidence for hypothyroidism in any patient, and T3, T4, and TSH concentrations were within the normal range. Two patients who had retarded bone ages were treated with triiodothyronine for 6 months. Hyperthyroidism developed when T3 levels exceeded physiologic concentrations in these patients. The concept that the clinical response to triiodothyronine in autistic patients results from correction of thyroid dysfunction is not supported by these findings.

Twenty-three psychotic children ranging in age from 5 to 16 were interviewed in half-hour play sessions. The play session comprised three activities designed to elicit statements using the pronouns I, you, and he to express the concepts of possession, action, and description. It was hypothesized that psychotic children would use the third-person pronoun he more readily than the first-person pronoun I (Hypothesis I), and that possession, action, and description statements would develop in an orderly sequence as predicted by Bosch (1962/1970) (Hypothesis II). Hypothesis I was not confirmed: Some of the least advanced psychotic children used the pronoun I, and only the most advanced children used you and he. Hypothesis II was confirmed: the least advanced children used pronouns correctly in statements expressing the concept of possession, whereas the most advanced children had mastered all three contexts of pronoun use. These results have implications for language therapy, and they are concordant with the language theories of Piaget and Werner and Kaplan.

Two groups of three autistic children, equated for chronological age but differing in IQ and performance MA, were observed for 20-minute sessions. Total duration of time subjects engaged in stereotyped behavior was recorded for each minute. During minutes 6--15, subjects were provided with either minimal or high environmental stimulation. High environmental stimulation was found to increase the mean duration of time the low-IQ group engaged in stereotyped behavior but to decrease the duration for the high-IQ group. The theoretical implications are discussed.

A placebo-controlled crossover study of behavioral effects of triiodothyronine (T3) was conducted in 30 young clinically euthyroid autistic children. Multiple independent raters and multiple rating scales were used. Except for a few symptoms that were reduced on T3, the drug did not differ from placebo. Time itself accounted for most of the improvement in the whole sample. As a group, the lower IQ children responded to T3. The individual children who were responders could not be defined by any parameter.

The relationship between a newborn score of minor physical anomalies (MPAs) and behavior at ages 1 and 2 was examined. From an initial screening population of 933, 63 high anomaly and 78 low anomaly infants were followed until age 2 by examiners blind for the newborn anomaly score. High anomaly infants were more likely to be temperamentally difficult as rated by parent interview and direct observation. A subgroup of six infants who were considered irritable at both ages 1 and 2 were all from the high anomaly group. However, there was little agreement between behavioral ratings across situations and over time, and there were no significant predictors of behavior problems at age 2 based on any newborn or 1-year measure. These results indicate that the newborn anomaly score by itself is unlikely to prove clinically useful in predicting preschool behavior problems for an unselected population. The usefulness of this measure for other, "high-risk," populations remains to be explored.