Self-reported Everyday Sources of Happiness and Unhappiness in Autistic Adults.

PURPOSE: Daily mood can be influenced by a range of experiences. Identifying everyday life experiences that make autistic adults happy and unhappy holds potential to foster positive mood and tackle mental health problems amongst this group. METHODS: A total of 293 autistic adults between the ages of 18 to 35 years old (mean age of 26.51 years old (SD = 4.62); 43.3% female gender, 4.8% nonbinary) provided open-text responses regarding everyday sources of happiness and unhappiness. Using an iterative process of inductive coding, 14 happy themes and 22 unhappy themes of mood-changing life experiences were identified based on self-report qualitative data. RESULTS: Common themes across the happy and unhappy domain involved social partners, social interactions, and engagement in recreational and employment activities, with additional distinct themes specific to happy or unhappy mood. Top themes identified in the happy domain emphasizes encouraging quality relationships and positive interactions with others and cultivating supportive work/societal environments to build a sense of achievement and value. Meanwhile, emotional tolls accompanied negative relationships and interactions, underscoring the necessity to provide autistic adults with conflict resolution and coping skills to increase feelings of happiness. CONCLUSION: Overall, the wide range of sources of happy and unhappy everyday experiences highlights the importance of considering personal preferences in engagement with others and activities in treatment.

Exploring Key Physiological System Profiles at Rest and the Association with Depressive Symptoms in Autism Spectrum Disorder.

Depression is often associated with dysfunction in the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis and autonomic nervous system (ANS). Individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) may experience physiological dysregulation and psychological comorbidities; however, the extent to which the interactions between these systems predict internalizing symptoms in ASD has not been investigated. The study examined interactions with the HPA axis and ANS in 10-13-year-old children with ASD (n = 41) and typical development (TD; n = 46). The interrelated systems uniquely contributed to depressive symptoms in ASD above and beyond any system in isolation. A reciprocal, parasympathetic-dominant ANS was related to fewer affective symptoms in ASD. Findings highlight the importance of examining arousal across multiple systems to more precisely identify profiles associated with maladaptive psychiatric outcomes in ASD.

Relationship satisfaction, parenting stress, and depression in mothers of children with autism.

Mothers of children with autism report higher levels of depression than mothers of children with other developmental disabilities. We explored the relations between child characteristics of diagnostic severity and problem behaviors, parenting stress, relationship quality, and depressive symptoms in 70 mothers of young children with autism. We hypothesized that relationship quality and parenting stress would relate to maternal depression beyond contributions of child characteristics. Multiple regression analysis revealed a main effect of parenting stress above and beyond child problem behaviors and autism severity. A significant interaction emerged, with relationship quality buffering the effect of parenting stress on depression. Results suggest that the relation between child problem behaviors and maternal depression should be considered in conjunction with other measures of marriage and family stress. Relationship quality and parenting stress may also represent important factors to be explicitly considered within intervention paradigms for young children with autism spectrum disorders.