Autism - a greater problem now than before? On autism, school performance and mental health issues over time

Research problems and specific questionsThe number of individuals diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) has increased by at least 500% the last decades and empirical evidence shows that the reported negative mental health effects of ASD symptoms have increased substantially compared to 10-years ago.

Thus, the impairment inferred by symptoms is not merely contingent on the degree of symptomatology but also on the make-up and demands of surrounding context, which seems to have changed during the last decades.

We believe that the school setting is one such critical context, which might have changed to the worse for people with ASD.  1.How has the associations between ASD diagnosis and ASD symptoms in childhood and school performance and mental health in adolescence changed during the last decades?

In particular, we wish to test the hypotheses that declining school performance mediates the stronger association between ASD in childhood and mental health problems, and that this complex association is moderated by a) the presence of a formal ASD diagnosis and b) degree of autism symptomatology in childhood.                                                         2.How have individuals who wish to remove their ASD diagnosis in adult age a) experienced the school environment and school performance visavi their initial ASD diagnosis and b) to what extent and in which ways the presence of an ASD  diagnosis has shaped their understanding of their school experience and their child and adult mental health.Data and method RQ1 will be investigated by using the world’s largest longitudinal psychiatric twin study, containing continuous and categorical measures of ASD, which is augmented with register-based data.

RQ2 will be investigated in an ongoing clinical project in which individuals who wish to remove their ASD diagnosis will be interviewed as regards the role of the context for mental health and impairment.

Societal relevance relvance and utilisation Currently, it is known that 50% of children with ASD do not graduate with passing grades from junior secondary school – and are thus not eligible to upper secondary school, which in and of itself is associated with a wide range of adult mental health problems and hardships in adult life.Plan for project realisationBuilding upon existing infrastructures we will use quantitative and qualitative methods.

The project group is truly translational spanning over several disciplines and is anchored in clinical practice.