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Elaine B. Clarke, Catherine Lord, Vanessa Hus Bal
(2026).
Relative strengths in daily living skills among autistic individuals and individuals with related developmental conditions who have co‐occurring intellectual disability.
Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 67(7), 1147-1158.
Wiley.
- Publication date
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28 Jan 2026
- Identifier
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10.1111/jcpp.70124
- Authors
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Elaine B. Clarke,
Catherine Lord,
Vanessa Hus Bal
- Source
- Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry
- Details
- 67(7), 1147-1158
- Reference type
- article
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Metadata source
- crossref
Abstract
Background Strong daily living skills (DLS) are associated with positive outcomes. Prior studies have documented intellectual quotient (IQ)‐DLS discrepancies in autistic individuals with average or higher cognitive abilities. Little work in this area includes individuals with co‐occurring intellectual disability (ID) or examines IQ‐DLS discrepancies at the level of DLS subdomains (i.e., Personal, Domestic, and Community skills). This study examined trajectories of IQ‐DLS discrepancies from ages 2–25 in autistic individuals with ID. Methods A total of 127 individuals from a well‐characterized longitudinal cohort with verbal IQ DLS (cognitive abilities exceeded DLS) and IQ DLS group. An additional group, IQ = DLS (cognitive abilities and DLS were commensurate), emerged in each of the DLS subdomains, for a total of three trajectory groups. Within DLS subdomains, approximately 80% of participants were in either the IQ = DLS or the IQ < DLS trajectory group. In other words, examining scores at the DLS domain‐level indicated most participants had cognitive abilities that exceeded DLS, but subdomain scores indicated most participants had DLS that equaled or exceeded cognitive abilities. Conclusions These results challenge the notion that autism is usually associated with weaknesses in DLS compared to IQ. At the subdomain level, 80% of participants had DLS commensurate with or stronger than their cognitive abilities, indicating domain‐level scores may obscure important variability in daily functioning. This work highlights the importance of including autistic individuals with ID in research; patterns observed in samples without ID may not be generalizable.
Study authors in this cited reference