Age of First Walking and Associations with Symptom Severity in Children with Suspected or Diagnosed Autism Spectrum Disorder.
Lise Reindal, Terje Nærland, Bernhard Weidle and 3 others
PMID 31278523WHAT IT FOUND
Children with autism walked independently later than peers, and later walking linked to more severe autistic symptoms.
This association held after adjusting for IQ and other factors. Delayed walking is not specific to autism, but warrants considering autism as a possible diagnosis, especially in girls.
Key findings
01Mean age of first walking was later in the autism group than the non-autism group (14.7 vs 13.8 months) and later than the national norm (12.86 months).
02Later age of first walking was associated with greater severity of autistic symptoms on the ADI-R, explaining 7.0% of the variance after adjusting for confounders like IQ.
03Females with autistic symptoms showed a tendency toward later walking regardless of whether they received an autism diagnosis, unlike males where the delay was specific to the diagnosed group.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for PTsWhat it means for OTsWhat it means for SLPs
Read the rest of this summary
You get three full summaries a month, free, and we do not ask for a card. Search, the TL;DRs and your library stay unlimited either way.
What it does not show
The data on age of first walking was collected retrospectively via parent report and medical records, which introduces the possibility of recall bias. There was no typically developing control group in the study itself; comparisons were made against a separate normative dataset. The study included children referred to specialist services, so the results may not apply to children with autism who were never referred or diagnosed. Missing data on nonverbal IQ and symptom measures meant that some analyses used fewer than the total 490 participants, and multiple imputation was used to handle this. The association between age of walking and symptom severity was modest, explaining only a small percentage of the variance.
Declared interests
The study was funded by Norges Forskningsråd (Research Council of Norway) and Helse Sør-Øst RHF (South-Eastern Norway Regional Health Authority). No commercial conflicts of interest were reported.
The easy way to misread this
Do not assume that delayed walking confirms an autism diagnosis. The study found that 25% of children without an autism diagnosis also walked late, and the association between walking age and symptom severity was modest. Delayed walking is a risk marker that warrants further assessment, not a diagnostic criterion.