IQ and Internalising Symptoms in Adolescents with ASD.
Monisha Edirisooriya, Dominika Dykiert, Bonnie Auyeung
PMID 33381856WHAT IT FOUND
Adolescents with ASD and lower IQs reported significantly more anxiety, but parents did not.
Higher IQs were linked to more depression. Clinicians must ask adolescents directly about anxiety rather than relying on parent reports, especially for those with lower cognitive abilities.
Key findings
01Self-reported anxiety was moderately higher in adolescents with lower IQs, whereas parent-reported anxiety showed no such association.
02A small positive correlation was found between higher IQ and depression, though this became non-significant after adjusting for publication bias.
03The main analysis found no significant overall association between IQ and anxiety before accounting for who reported the symptoms.
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 could not account for specific anxiety subtypes (e.g., social phobia vs. separation anxiety), which may have different relationships with IQ. Only four studies provided effect sizes for depression, preventing sub-group analyses for this outcome. There is a significant gender imbalance, with most samples being over 50% male, limiting generalisability to females with ASD. The literature is understudied regarding individuals with low IQs; only a small number of studies included participants with below-average IQs. Publication bias was evident, particularly for depression, where the significant finding became non-significant after adjustment. The definition of adolescence was broad (mean age 10-19), potentially mixing different developmental stages.
Declared interests
The study was funded by the University of Edinburgh. No specific conflicts of interest were declared by the authors.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that IQ is unrelated to anxiety in ASD. The main null result masks a significant finding: adolescents with lower IQs report much higher anxiety than their parents observe. Relying on parent reports alone will miss this distress in cognitively diverse groups.