Measurement properties of the Body Awareness Scale Movement Quality (BAS MQ) in persons on the autism spectrum: A preliminary Rasch analysis.

BACKGROUND: Persons on the autism spectrum exhibit poorer body awareness than neurotypical persons. Since movement quality may be regarded as an expression of body awareness, assessment of movement quality is important. Sound assessments of measurement properties are essential if reliable decisions about body awareness interventions for persons on the autism spectrum are to be made, but there is insufficient research. OBJECTIVE: To assess measurement properties of the Body Awareness Scale Movement Quality (BAS MQ) in an autism and a neurotypical reference group. METHODS: Persons on the autism spectrum (n=108) and neurotypical references (n=32) were included. All were assessed with BAS MQ. Data were analyzed according to the Rasch model. RESULTS: BAS MQ was found to have acceptable unidimensionality, supported by the fit statistics. The hierarchical ordering showed that coordination ability was the most difficult, followed by stability and relating. Response category functioning worked as intended for 19 out of 23 items. There were few difficult items, which decreased targeting. Reliability measures were good. BAS MQ discriminated between the autism and the reference groups, with the autism group exhibiting poorer movement quality, reflecting clinical observations and previous research. CONCLUSIONS: BAS MQ was found to have acceptable measurement properties, though suffering from problems with targeting item difficulty to person ability for persons on the autism spectrum. The BAS MQ may, along with experienced movement quality, contribute to clinically relevant information of persons on the autism spectrum, although we encourage refinements and further analyses to improve its measurement properties.

Heterogeneity of contractile 5-HT receptors in human hand veins.

To increase our knowledge of human peripheral vasospasm we characterized the contractile 5-hydroxytryptamine (5-HT) receptors in human superficial hand vein segments in vitro. The 5-HT1 receptor agonist, sumatriptan, the 5-HT2 receptor agonist, dl-alpha-methyl-5-HT, and the 5-HT3 receptor agonist, 2-methyl-5-HT, all induced concentration-dependent contractions. The contractile response to sumatriptan was antagonized by the non-selective 5-HT receptor antagonist, methiothepin, but was unaffected by the 5-HT2 receptor antagonist, ketanserin. The contractile response to dl-alpha-methyl-5-HT was antagonized by both methiothepin and ketanserin. The contraction elicited by 2-methyl-5-HT was not affected by the 5-HT3 receptor antagonist, MDL 72222, but was antagonized by ketanserin. The results suggest that serotonergic contraction in the human superficial hand vein involves both 5-HT1 and 5-HT2 but not 5-HT3 receptors. Such receptor heterogeneity in human blood vessels should be considered when using drugs and when designing future compounds for medical use.