Sleep disturbance and association with social behavior in preschool children with autism spectrum disorder / 中国康复理论与实践

ABSTRACT

ObjectiveTo explore sleep disturbance in preschool children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and analyze the relationship between sleep disturbance and social behavior. MethodsFrom December, 2020 to December, 2022, 221 preschool children with ASD from Beijing Bo'ai Hospital and other two institutes, and 246 healthy preschool children socially recruited were investigated with Children's Sleep Habits Questionnaire (CSHQ). A total of 47 ASD children and 47 healthy children were selected from them to wear a sleep monitoring watch for seven days, while the ASD children were evaluated with Gesell Development Diagnosis Scale (GDDS), Psychoeducational Profile-Third Edition (PEP-3), Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule-2 (ADOS), Autism Behavior Checklist (ABC), Childhood Autism Rating Scale (CARS) and Social Responsiveness Scale (SRS). ResultsAll the factor-scores were more in the ASD children than in the healthy children (t > 2.491, P < 0.05), except that of daytime sleepiness. The prevalence of sleep disturbance (CSHQ ≥ 41) was 89.6% in ASD children, which was more than that of the healthy children (76.8%) (χ2 = 13.360, P < 0.001). The sleep problems in ASD children included bedtime resistance, sleep anxiety, sleep duration, sleep onset delay, parasomnias and sleep disordered breathing. ASD children were shorter in total bedtime, shorter in total sleep time, longer in sleep latency, longer in awake time and lower in sleep efficiency (|t| > 2.001, P < 0.05), compared with those of healthy children. For ASD children, the total bedtime negatively correlated with GDDS-language, PEP-3-expressive language, PEP-3-communication and PEP-3-maladaptive behaviors (r < -0.300, P < 0.05); the sleep efficiency negatively correlated with total score of CARS (r = -0.365, P < 0.05); sleep latency correlated with GDDS-social, PEP-3-cognitive, PEP-3-expressive language, PEP-3-receptive language, PEP-3-visual-motor imitation, PEP-3-characteristic verbal behaviors, PEP-3-communication, original score of ADOS, ADOS-social affect, and total score of CARS (|r| > 2.90, P < 0.05); and total awake time positively correlated with total score of CARS (r = 0.406, P < 0.05). ConclusionSleep disturbance is prevalent and various in preschool ASD children, and influence their social behaviors.