Brief Report: Socioeconomic Factors Associated with Minimally Verbal Status in Individuals with ASD.
Nell Maltman, Leann Smith DaWalt, Jinkuk Hong and 1 others
PMID 32914289WHAT IT FOUND
In 404 adolescents/adults with ASD, 155 who were minimally verbal at age four to five were verbal later.
Always minimally verbal status was associated with lower daily living skills and lower parent college completion and family income.
Key findings
01155 of 404 adolescents and adults with ASD were minimally verbal at age four to five but were verbal during adolescence or adulthood, while 105 remained minimally verbal.
02The always minimally verbal group had lower daily living skills and a greater proportion with intellectual disability than the other verbal status groups.
03Verbal status groups differed by parent college completion, family income at or above about $50,000, and race, but not by parental marital status or overall employment status.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for OTsWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
The analysis used data from the first timepoint, so it describes associations at a single timepoint rather than change over time. Verbal status was based on mothers' report of their child's language at age four to five and later, which may have introduced error. The sample was mostly White and drawn from Wisconsin and Massachusetts, so results may not apply to other groups. Participants were classified by spoken verbal ability, so the study could not capture the range of alternative communication strategies used. Family income, parent education, and race were associated with verbal status, but the study did not show they caused verbal status or that changing them would change communication.
Declared interests
The authors declared no conflict of interest.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that low family income, less parent education, or racial background caused minimally verbal status, or that improving those factors will make someone verbal. This was an observational report from the first timepoint, based on maternal interview, and it did not test any intervention.