Sleep, anxiety and challenging behaviour in children with intellectual disability and/or autism spectrum disorder

This publication is included in the Autistic Autism Scholarship Project. one author of this publication is identified as autistic in the project.

About the autistic author marker

Rzepecka, H., McKenzie, K., McClure, I., & Murphy, S. (2011). Sleep, anxiety and challenging behaviour in children with intellectual disability and/or autism spectrum disorder. Research in Developmental Disabilities, 32(6), 2758-2766. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ridd.2011.05.034

Publication date: 28 Jun 2011 Added to AutiHub: 6 Jul 2026 Type: Article Article language: English

This publication is integrated into AutiHub through:

Authors

Publication authors
4
Publication authors identified as autistic
1 / 4 (25.0%)

Abstract

Children with an intellectual disability (ID) and/or autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are known to suffer from significantly more sleep problems, anxiety and challenging behaviour (CB) than typically developing children (TD), yet little is known about the relationship between these factors in the child ID/ASD population. The study aim was to examine these relationships. We hypothesised that there would be significant positive correlations between the three factors and that sleep problems and anxiety would predict a significant amount of the variance in levels of CB. Parental measures of sleep problems, anxiety and CB were completed by 187 parents of children with ID and/or ASD. Significant positive associations were found between the three factors. A hierarchical multiple regression showed that medication, sleep problems and anxiety accounted for 42% of the variance in CB, with a large effect size. These findings suggest that these relationships should be considered during clinical practice, particularly in the case of CB interventions where sleep problems and/or anxiety are also present.

Bibliography cited by this reference

Cited references are imported from external metadata sources when they are available. The list may be partial.

Cited bibliography overview

These indicators describe the bibliography cited by this publication. An author name is counted each time it appears in one cited reference, so the same person can be counted more than once. Names not yet linked to an author already present in AutiHub are treated as unknown, not as non-autistic. Last computed: 2 Oct 2026 08:04.

Cited references
77
With a DOI
66
Without a DOI, from raw bibliography text
9
1 / 77 (1.3%) cited references include at least one author identified as autistic.
References with data to complete
1 / 77 (1.3%)
References with detected author names
76 / 77 (98.7%)
Without detected author names
1
Without a structured title
0
Without a stable identifier
8
References with raw author names still to review
0
References with external metadata lookup issues
1
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
217
From DOI or external metadata
217
From validated raw bibliography text
0
Raw names already validated
0
Raw names still to review
0
35 / 217 (16.1%) names are linked to an author already present in AutiHub. 182 / 217 (83.9%) names are not yet linked.
Names linked to a person identified as autistic
1 / 217 (0.5%)
Calculated across all author names detected in the cited bibliography. Among names linked to an author already present in AutiHub: 1 / 35 (2.9%). Distinct people identified as autistic: 1 / 189 (0.5%).
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