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Sleep and Activity Patterns in Autism Spectrum Disorder
Biorxiv : the Preprint Server for Biology
|May 20, 2024
Summary
Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is linked to sleep disturbances and altered physical activity patterns. Variability in sleep and activity strongly predicts ASD status, with stronger correlations observed in autistic individuals.
Area of Science:
- Neurodevelopmental Disorders
- Sleep Science
- Behavioral Neuroscience
Background:
- Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a complex neurodevelopmental condition with high heritability and significant heterogeneity.
- Sleep disturbances are frequently reported in individuals with ASD, affecting 44-83% and potentially sharing neurodevelopmental underpinnings with ASD.
- Understanding the interplay between sleep, physical activity, and ASD is crucial for developing targeted interventions.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the association between quantitative sleep and physical activity traits and Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) status.
- To identify specific actimetry measures that can predict ASD.
- To examine the interplay between sleep and physical activity in individuals with ASD compared to their relatives.
Main Methods:
- Recruited 382 individuals with ASD and 223 family members for data collection.
- Utilized wearable device-based accelerometers to gather three weeks of physical activity and sleep data.
- Applied machine learning (elastic net) and statistical modeling (linear mixed-effects regressions) to analyze data from over 6,800 days.
Main Results:
- Identified 59 out of 242 actimetry measures significantly associated with ASD status, validated in a separate test set (AUC: 0.777).
- Found that both the average duration and day-to-day variability of physical activity were linked to ASD.
- Observed a stronger correlation between physical activity and sleep in individuals with ASD, indicating that reduced activity more significantly impacted their sleep.
Conclusions:
- Average sleep/physical activity duration and its variation are strong predictors of ASD status.
- Physical activity measures correlate with sleep quality, traits, and regularity, with heightened correlations in ASD.
- Further interventional research is recommended to explore if improving sleep and physical activity can ameliorate core ASD symptoms.
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