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Clinical correlates of sluggish cognitive tempo in adolescents with autism spectrum disorder.

ABSTRACT: Adolescents with autism spectrum disorder frequently experience social communication difficulties, executive functioning deficits, and anxiety and depressive symptoms, which are similar to the symptoms and correlates of sluggish cognitive tempo. Although sluggish cognitive tempo is related to, but distinct from, the inattentive and hyperactive-impulsive symptoms of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder that commonly co-occur with autism spectrum disorder, few studies have examined sluggish cognitive tempo in autism spectrum disorder. We examined whether sluggish cognitive tempo and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder were differentially associated with autism symptomatology, daily life executive functioning, and internalizing and externalizing symptoms in 51 adolescents (ages 13-18?years) with autism spectrum disorder without intellectual disability. Regression analyses controlling for age and IQ showed that sluggish cognitive tempo symptoms, but not attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder symptoms, were associated with increased autism symptomatology and internalizing symptoms. Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder symptoms, but not sluggish cognitive tempo symptoms, were associated with increased externalizing behaviors and behavior regulation deficits. Both sluggish cognitive tempo and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder were independently associated with increased metacognitive deficits. This study provides preliminary evidence that sluggish cognitive tempo symptoms are elevated in autism spectrum disorder and associated with key clinical correlates, with implications for the assessment and treatment in adolescents with autism spectrum disorder.

SUBMITTER: Duncan A

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6517090 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Clinical correlates of sluggish cognitive tempo in adolescents with autism spectrum disorder.

Duncan Amie A Tamm Leanne L Birnschein Allison M AM Becker Stephen P SP

Autism : the international journal of research and practice 20181114 6

Adolescents with autism spectrum disorder frequently experience social communication difficulties, executive functioning deficits, and anxiety and depressive symptoms, which are similar to the symptoms and correlates of sluggish cognitive tempo. Although sluggish cognitive tempo is related to, but distinct from, the inattentive and hyperactive-impulsive symptoms of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder that commonly co-occur with autism spectrum disorder, few studies have examined sluggish co ...[more]

PMID: 30426763

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Project description:ObjectiveSluggish cognitive tempo refers to a constellation of symptoms that include slowed behavior/thinking, reduced alertness, and getting lost in one's thoughts. Despite the moniker "sluggish cognitive tempo," the evidence is mixed regarding the extent to which it is associated globally with slowed (sluggish) mental (cognitive) information processing speed (tempo).MethodA well-characterized clinical sample of 132 children ages 8-13 years (M = 10.34, SD = 1.51; 47 girls; 67% White/non-Hispanic) were administered multiple, counterbalanced neurocognitive tests and assessed for sluggish cognitive tempo symptoms via multiple-informant reports.ResultsBayesian linear regressions revealed significant evidence against associations between sluggish cognitive tempo and computationally modeled processing speed (BF01 > 3.70), and significant evidence for associations with slower working memory manipulation speed. These findings were consistent across parent and teacher models, with and without control for attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder inattentive symptoms and IQ. There was also significant evidence linking faster inhibition speed with higher parent-reported sluggish cognitive tempo symptoms.ConclusionsThese findings provide strong evidence against characterizing children with sluggish cognitive tempo symptoms as possessing a globally sluggish cognitive tempo. Instead, these symptoms appear to be related, to a significant extent, to executive dysfunction characterized by working memory systems that are too slow and inhibition systems that are too fast. Behaviorally, these findings suggest that requiring extra time to rearrange the active contents of working memory delays responding, whereas an overactive inhibition system likely terminates thoughts too quickly and therefore prevents intended behaviors from starting or completing, thereby giving the appearance that children are absent-minded or failing to act when expected. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).

Project description:Although multiple cross-sectional studies have shown symptoms of sluggish cognitive tempo (SCT) and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) to be statistically distinct, studies have yet to examine the temporal stability and measurement invariance of SCT in a longitudinal sample. To date, only six studies have assessed SCT longitudinally, with the longest study examining SCT over a 2-year period. The overall goals of this study were to assess the 10-year longitudinal stability and interfactor relationships of ADHD and SCT symptoms among a community sample of children.Confirmatory factor analysis was used to assess the temporal invariance of ADHD and SCT symptoms in a large population-based longitudinal sample (International Longitudinal Twin Study of Early Reading Development) that included children assessed at preschool and after kindergarten, first, second, fourth, and ninth grades (n = 489). Latent autoregressive models were then estimated to assess the stability of these constructs.Results demonstrated invariance of item loadings and intercepts from preschool through ninth grades, as well as invariance of interfactor correlations. Results further indicated that both ADHD and SCT are highly stable across these years of development, that these symptom dimensions are related but also separable, and that hyperactivity/impulsivity and SCT are both more strongly correlated with inattention than with each other and show differential developmental trajectories. Specifically, even in the presence of latent simplex analyses providing support for the developmental stability of these dimensions, linear comparisons indicated that that mean levels of hyperactivity/impulsivity decreased with time, inattentive ratings were generally stable, and SCT tended to increase slightly across development.This study adds to the current literature by being the first to systematically assess and demonstrate the temporal invariance and stability of ADHD and SCT across a span of 10 years.

Dataset Information

Clinical correlates of sluggish cognitive tempo in adolescents with autism spectrum disorder.

Publications

Clinical correlates of sluggish cognitive tempo in adolescents with autism spectrum disorder.

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