A Combined Study on the Use of the Child Behavior Checklist 1½-5 for Identifying Autism Spectrum Disorders at 18 Months.
Natasha Chericoni, Giulia Balboni, Valeria Costanzo and 7 others
PMID 33394248WHAT IT FOUND
Parent report scores on the Child Behavior Checklist distinguished clinically referred toddlers with autism from typical peers at 18 months, but failed to identify autism in siblings of autistic children, whose scores remained in the normal range.
Key findings
01In clinically referred toddlers, the Withdrawn and Pervasive Developmental Problems scales significantly differentiated children who later received an ASD diagnosis from matched typical development controls.
02In siblings of children with ASD, the same scales failed to differentiate those who developed ASD from those who did not or from typical controls, with scores remaining below clinical cut-offs.
03Parent ratings on the checklist showed no significant correlation with clinician observations on the ADOS-2 in the sibling group, unlike in the clinically referred group.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
The group of siblings who developed ASD was very small (n=10), which reduces the statistical power to detect differences. The typical development group was not followed up to 30 months, so it is possible some children in this group developed issues later. Cognitive ability was not measured for all children in the typical development group, requiring the use of a smaller subset for comparison.
The easy way to misread this
Do not assume the Child Behavior Checklist is a valid screening tool for all 18-month-olds. It accurately identified autism in children already referred for clinical concern but missed autism in siblings of affected children, whose parent-reported scores looked typical.