Executive functioning skills in early childhood children with autism, intellectual disability, and co-occurring autism and intellectual disability

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McClain, M. B., Golson, M. E., & Murphy, L. (2022). Executive functioning skills in early childhood children with autism, intellectual disability, and co-occurring autism and intellectual disability. Research in Developmental Disabilities, 122, Article 104169. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ridd.2021.104169

Publication date: 15 Jan 2022 Added to AutiHub: 9 Oct 2026 Type: Article Article language: English
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Authors

Publication authors
3
Publication authors identified as autistic
1 / 3 (33.3%)
  1. Maryellen Brunson McClain
  2. Megan E. Golson
  3. Laura Murphy *

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Many children with autism and intellectual disability (ID) experience executive functioning (EF) difficulties. However, there is minimal research on EF skills in children with autism, ID, and co-occurring autism/ID in early childhood. AIMS: To address this gap in the research, we evaluated EF profiles using the BRIEF-P among early childhood children (2-5 years of age) with autism, ID, and co-occurring autism/ID. METHOD AND PROCEDURES: Participants in the current study were 87 children between the ages of 24 and 71 months (M = 46.8, SD = 12.7) diagnosed with autism (n = 24, 27.6 %), ID (n = 23, 26.4 %), or co-occurring autism/ID (n = 40, 46.0 %) that completed a comprehensive psychological evaluation at a university development center. We used a mixed Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) and between- and within-subjects ANOVAs as follow-up analyses. OUTCOMES AND RESULTS: Results suggested that early childhood children with autism, ID, and autism/ID may have unique EF skill profiles. Children with ID exhibited the most significant EF impairments and children with autism had the least. Working memory was the most impaired EF domain across all diagnostic groups. CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS: Overall, our findings show that early childhood children with autism, ID, and autism/ID exhibit difficulties in EF skills. Children with ID exhibit the most significant EF impairments whereas children with autism show the least. However, regardless of diagnosis, working memory is the most impaired EF skill.

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Cited references
12
With a DOI
11
Without a DOI, from raw bibliography text
1
0 / 12 (0.0%) cited references include at least one author identified as autistic.
References with data to complete
0 / 12 (0.0%)
References with detected author names
12 / 12 (100.0%)
Without detected author names
0
Without a structured title
0
Without a stable identifier
1
References with raw author names still to review
0
References with external metadata lookup issues
0
These indicators apply to cited references displayed on this page, after technical duplicates have been merged. A reference without a DOI can still support author statistics when a title and author names are available.
Author names detected in the cited bibliography
72
From DOI or external metadata
72
From validated raw bibliography text
0
Raw names already validated
0
Raw names still to review
0
8 / 72 (11.1%) names are linked to an author already present in AutiHub. 64 / 72 (88.9%) names are not yet linked.
Names linked to a person identified as autistic
0 / 72 (0.0%)
Calculated across all author names detected in the cited bibliography. Among names linked to an author already present in AutiHub: 0 / 8 (0.0%). Distinct people identified as autistic: 0 / 72 (0.0%).
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