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Related Experiment Video

Updated: Aug 12, 2025

Testing Sensory and Multisensory Function in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Testing Sensory and Multisensory Function in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Published on: April 22, 2015

A longitudinal study on cognitive aging in autism.

C Torenvliet¹, A P Groenman², T A Radhoe¹

¹Dutch Autism and ADHD Research Center, Brain and Cognition, Department of Psychology, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

Psychiatry Research

|January 29, 2023

Summary

This summary is machine-generated.

Cognitive aging in autistic adults mirrors that of non-autistic adults. This large longitudinal study found no evidence of accelerated cognitive decline in autism spectrum disorder (ASD) without intellectual disability.

Keywords:

Aging Autism Cognition

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Area of Science:

Neuroscience
Psychology
Developmental Science

Background:

Longitudinal studies on cognitive aging in autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are limited and often lack statistical power.
Understanding cognitive changes in autistic adults is crucial for developing targeted support and interventions.
Existing research provides insufficient data on how cognition evolves in autistic individuals throughout adulthood.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate cognitive aging in autistic adults compared to non-autistic adults.
To determine if autistic individuals experience accelerated cognitive decline.
To analyze cognitive changes over time in a large cohort of adults with and without ASD.

Main Methods:

Employed reliable change indices (RCIs) and multilevel models to analyze cognitive changes.
Assessed 128 autistic and 112 non-autistic adults across 15 cognitive measures.
Collected data over two to three timepoints with an average interval of 3.5 years, covering ages 24-85.

Main Results:

No significant differences in cognitive changes over time were found between autistic and non-autistic groups using RCIs.
Multilevel models indicated cross-sectional age-related effects and longitudinal changes across most cognitive tasks.
Crucially, these age and time-related cognitive effects did not differ significantly between the autism and non-autism groups, supported by Bayesian analyses.

Conclusions:

Cognitive aging appears to be parallel in autistic and non-autistic adults.
Autistic adults, particularly those diagnosed in adulthood without intellectual disability, do not exhibit an increased risk for accelerated cognitive decline.
Findings suggest similar trajectories of cognitive aging across the lifespan for autistic and neurotypical individuals.