Changing autism traits found to have ties with mental health conditions

A long-term study found a correlation between children's development of extra mental health issues during their primary school years and changes in basic autism features. The research was released in Autism. Einat Waizbard-Bartov, a doctoral researcher in developmental psychology at the UC Davis MIND Institute and the lead author of the paper, said, "Our findings suggest that different aspects of a child's development may affect each other over time. Core autism traits and mental health challenges likely interact throughout development."
One important outcome supported the notion that these behaviours can be helpful for autistic people: lowering restricted and repetitive behaviours in primary school was associated with the appearance of mental health issues.
"We were pleased to see that our results confirmed what has been suspected by other autism researchers and clinicians as well as autistic individuals, that some forms of restricted and repetitive behaviours can potentially help to self-soothe," said David Amaral, distinguished professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, MIND Institute faculty member and senior author on the paper. Waizbard-Bartov notes that the findings question the wisdom of therapies that eliminate these behaviours. "In light of this, when thinking about interventions, it might be that trying to eliminate repetitive behaviours without providing alternative self-soothing tools is not the ideal way to go," she said.