Mood Disorders in Mothers of Children on the Autism Spectrum Are Associated with Higher Functioning Autism
Table 1
Demographic and clinical characteristics of the final study sample of maternal-child dyads after all exclusions were applied (n = 998).
Autistic disorder
Asperger disorder
Fisher’s exact/paired t-test P value
n = 690 (69.8%)
n = 308 (31.2%)
Mean maternal age (SD)*
38.6 (6.7)
41.7 (6.5)
<.001
Maternal race (% white)
632 (91.6)
296 (96.1)
<.05
Maternal ethnicity (% Hispanic)
47 (6.8)
10 (3.3)
<.05
Maternal education (% college degree)
344 (49.9)
173 (56.2)
ns
Urbanicity**
Large city (%)
157 (22.8)
66 (21.4)
ns
Suburban (%)
224 (32.5)
105 (34.1)
Small/med city (%)
210 (30.4)
92 (29.9)
Rural (%)
99 (14.4)
45 (14.6)
Maternal mood disorder diagnosis (%)
No mood
377 (54.6)
132 (42.9)
.001
Bipolar disorder
43 (6.2)
31 (10.1)
Depression
270 (39.1)
145 (47.1)
Mean child age (SD)*
8.3 (3.8)
11.1 (3.6)
<.001
Child gender (% female)
124 (18.0)
40 (13.0)
.052
Intellectual level***
IQ 116 (%)
23 (11.1)
108 (50.5)
<.001
Phase speech by age 3 years****
175 (26.9)
220 (74.1)
<.001
*Mean maternal and child age at the time the maternal mood disorder questionnaire was completed.
**Based on NCHS Urban-Rural (NCHSUR) Classification Scheme for Counties [21].
***n = 422 (208 with AUT; 214 with ASP).
****n = 948 (651 with AUT; 297 with ASP).
