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Sex differences in early brain development in a multi-site ASD likelihood cohort

Gabriel Blanco-Gomez1,2, Julie Scorah1,2, Christian O'Reilly3,4

  • 1Montreal Neurological Institute-Hospital, Montreal, QC, Canada.

Frontiers in Computational Neuroscience
|August 20, 2026
PubMed

Insights

Biological sex influences infant brain development and language. Females show distinct brain connectivity and faster language growth, highlighting sex-specific patterns relevant to autism spectrum disorder (ASD) research.

Area of Science:

  • Neuroscience
  • Developmental Psychology
  • Genetics

Background:

  • Biological sex is a key factor in brain organization, but its role in early neurodevelopment, especially in relation to autism spectrum disorder (ASD), is not well understood.
  • Existing research often overlooks sex as a variable, potentially masking crucial differences in developmental trajectories.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate sex differences in electroencephalogram (EEG) metrics during early development.
  • To determine if biological sex moderates the relationship between early brain activity and language development from 6 to 36 months.
  • To explore sex-specific biomarkers for autism spectrum disorder (ASD).

Main Methods:

  • Re-analysis of longitudinal EEG data from the International Infant EEG Data Integration Platform (EEG-IP) cohort.
  • Inclusion of 179 infants (91 males, 88 females) with elevated (ELA) and typical (TLA) likelihood of ASD.
  • Examination of EEG metrics, functional connectivity, and language development trajectories.

Main Results:

  • Females exhibited significantly higher left-hemisphere functional connectivity in speech regions at 6 months compared to males.
  • Females showed increased posterior theta consistency during face processing and steeper expressive language trajectories (6-36 months).
  • Early speech connectivity moderated receptive language growth in females, indicating sex-specific brain-language relationships.

Conclusions:

  • Biological sex is a critical variable in infant neurodevelopmental studies, including those focused on ASD.
  • Sex-differentiated brain profiles and language trajectories are evident in early development.
  • Findings support the investigation of sex-specific biomarkers for identifying and understanding ASD.

Keywords:
EEGautisminfant developmentlanguage developmentsex differences

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