Is my child naughty or autistic?
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Is my child naughty or autistic? Perceptions of family carers regarding challenging behaviour displayed by children with ASD
IRAS ID
170677
Contact name
Jenny Harbridge
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
East Kent Hospitals University Foundation NHS Trust
Clinicaltrials.gov Identifier
2015/paeds04, R&D
Duration of Study in the UK
0 years, 5 months, 3 days
Research summary
Around 650,000 of the UK’s population are affected by a spectrum of complex neurodevelopmental imbalances, known as Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). These figures suggest that in every local health areas there are more than 250 under 16-year-olds with an ASD diagnosis at any one time (National Autistic Society, 2003).
Challenging behaviour in a child with ASD may present itself as just ‘being naughty’; however it is often an attempt to function effectively in our socially driven world. The majority of babies and young children will at some point display a challenging behaviour such as crying. It is common knowledge that babies’ communication is limited, thus it is accepted that their interaction with others can often seem demanding. Typically developing children will soon mature and develop socially acceptable communication skills. In the absence of learning an effective method of communication, children with ASD can become frustrated which can contribute to challenging behaviour.
The current study will expand upon the reviewed literature and explore whether a greater knowledge of ASD is associated with parental attributions of their child’s challenging behaviour. This will be done through telephone interviews with parents, using Hasting's Challenging Behaviour Attribution Scale, Harris (1990) Challenging Behaviour Checklist and Hyman and Oliver's (2001) measures of attribution as reference points. Hastings concluded that challenging behaviour is caused by a range of intertwined social, biomedical, emotional and environmental factors. Using these findings, this study will investigate whether the same attributions are found in parents of children with ASD.
This project will investigate sources of ASD knowledge that parents seen by the child health team at East Kent Hospitals University NHS Foundation Trust can access. These sources include a one-day ASD parent’s workshop, Earlybird courses etc. A comparison of attributions will be made between parents who have a lot of knowledge and those who have less.
REC name
East of England - Essex Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
15/EE/0190
Date of REC Opinion
19 Jun 2015
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion