Validation of Autism Assessment Instruments for deaf children
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Diagnostic Instruments for Austim in Deaf children Study - Validation of Autism Assessment Instruments for deaf children
IRAS ID
170644
Contact name
Barry Wright
Contact email
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, 3 months, 30 days
Research summary
Research Summary:
Up to 4% of people who are deaf may have an Autism Spectrum Condition (ASC). However, this can be hard to identify because many of the methods used to diagnose an ASC were never designed with deaf children in mind. For example, some questions in current assessments ask about how a child responds when someone calls their name. Deaf children respond differently in many interactional situations compared to hearing children. These differences need to be taken into consideration in formal assessment. Misdiagnosis as a result of inappropriate assessments could lead to costs for individual children, their families and society. This project aims to rectify the current problems in diagnosis resulting from inappropriate assessment methods.The overall aim of this project is to develop and test a set of tools that will help us to confidently identify and diagnose ASCs in deaf children. We have adapted some of the existing measures of ASC, to create more appropriate assessments which are accessible to deaf and hearing parents and can be used effectively with deaf children. We have done this using an international panel of 39 experts in a Delphi Consensus process. The measures we have adapted are: a screening questionnaire (SRS-2), a play-based assessment (ADOS-2) and a parent interview (ADI-R).
To check if the adapted measures are appropriate for assessing ASC in deaf children we need to recruit families of deaf children/young people who have a diagnosis of ASC and those without ASC in order to make sure that the instruments are able to distinguish this difference (validation). This study also plans to recruit families of children who are deaf and hearing to check that the modified instruments are suitable for use with children with any level of deafness.
Lay summary of study results:
Autism assessment processes need to improve for deaf children as they are currently being diagnosed later than hearing children and they are often misdiagnosed. The DIADS study therefore adapted three different autism assessments to be accessible and suitable for deaf children and young people. These measures include; Social Responsiveness Scale, SRS-2 (a screening questionnaire), Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule, ADOS-2, (a play and interaction based observation), Autism Diagnostic Interview, ADIR (an interview to parents by a clinician).The measures were adapted with input from experts using a Delphi Consensus method, and the adapted measures were then tested with children and families. The results showed the adapted measured had the following accuracy rates:
- SRS-2 - could identify deaf children with autism at an accuracy of 82% and identify deaf children without autism at accuracy of 67%.
- ADOS-2- could identify deaf children with autism at an accuracy of 73% and identify deaf children without autism at accuracy of 71%.
- ADIR - could identify deaf children with autism at an accuracy of 89% and identify deaf children without autism at accuracy of 81%.Therefore the three adapted measures are very useful and appropriate to assess and identify if deaf children have or do not have autism. These measures are available for clinicians to use from WPS (Western Psychological Services).
REC name
Yorkshire & The Humber - South Yorkshire Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
15/YH/0093
Date of REC Opinion
17 Apr 2015
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion