Cultural influences on camouflaging and autistic burnout: Examining the experiences of Latino autistic young adults.

The study was cross-sectional, so it cannot show that cultural values, camouflaging, or burnout cause any outcome. Participants were already taking part in a multicomponent program, so they may differ from Latino autistic young adults who do not seek such services. No corrections for multiple comparisons were applied, so some significant correlations may be chance findings. The analysis relied on self-report, which can be affected by social desirability, differences in self-perception, and alexithymia; no caregiver or informant reports were used. The sample was 56 young adults, all identified as Latino and White, and the cultural values measure was developed for Mexican American values, so results may not apply to other Latino subgroups or to more diverse autistic populations. The regression models explained a relatively small proportion of variance, so other unmeasured factors likely influenced the outcomes.

Funding came from a University of Texas Health Science Center Houston Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences Seed grant, an Autism Speaks Postdoctoral Fellowship Grant [#13904], and the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS) of the National Institutes of Health through UTHealth-CCTS grant numbers 5TL1TR003169-05 and T32TR004904. The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest.

Do not read the association between higher camouflaging and higher adaptive functioning scores as evidence that camouflaging helps. The study was cross-sectional, and higher camouflaging was also associated with higher depression and anxiety scores.