Social responsiveness in children with developmental coordination disorder

Area of Science:

• Neurodevelopmental disorders
• Child psychology
• Motor skills development

Background:

• Developmental coordination disorder (DCD) is a neurodevelopmental condition impacting motor tasks.
• Emerging research indicates potential alterations in social skills among individuals with DCD.

Purpose of the Study:

• To determine if DCD impacts social responsiveness.
• To assess the effect of co-occurring autism spectrum disorder (ASD) on social responsiveness in children with DCD.
• To investigate the association between motor performance and social responsiveness in children with DCD.

Main Methods:

• Parental reports from children aged 5 to 15.5 years were used.
• Children were categorized into three groups: DCD only, DCD with suspected ASD (sASD), and DCD with confirmed ASD (cASD).
• Social Responsiveness Scale (SRS-2) and DCD-Questionnaire (DCD-Q) data were analyzed using t-tests, ANOVA, MANOVA, and Pearson correlations.

Main Results:

• Children with DCD exhibited social responsiveness difficulties across all areas, irrespective of ASD status (p<0.001).
• The sASD and cASD groups showed poorer SRS-2 and DCD-Q scores compared to the DCD-only group.
• Motor performance was weakly to moderately associated with overall social responsiveness and most subscales in the total group (r=-0.306 to -0.405; p ≤ 0.02).

Conclusions:

• Social responsiveness challenges are prevalent in children with DCD and are exacerbated by ASD.
• A weak to moderate association exists between motor performance and social responsiveness in children with DCD.