Autism screening questionnaire: diagnostic validity. Academic Article uri icon

Overview

abstract

  • BACKGROUND: Good interview and diagnostic measures for autism and other pervasive developmental disorders (PDDs) are available but there is a lack of a good screening questionnaire. AIMS: To develop and test a screening questionnaire based on items in the best available diagnostic interview--the Autism Diagnostic Interview--Revised (ADI-R). METHOD: A 40-item scale, the Autism Screening Questionnaire (ASQ), was developed and tested on a sample of 160 individuals with PDD and 40 with non-PDD diagnoses. RESULTS: The ASQ has good discriminative validity with respect to the separation of PDD from non-PDD diagnoses at all IQ levels, with a cut-off of 15 proving most effective. The differentiation between autism and other varieties of PDD was weaker. CONCLUSIONS: The ASQ is an effective screening questionnaire for PDD.

publication date

  • November 1, 1999

Research

keywords

  • Autistic Disorder
  • Mass Screening
  • Surveys and Questionnaires

Identity

Scopus Document Identifier

  • 0032743326

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

  • 10.1192/bjp.175.5.444

PubMed ID

  • 10789276

Additional Document Info

volume

  • 175