The relationship between left-behind status, screen time and behavior of autism in preschool children of rural area / 中华行为医学与脑科学杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective:To explore the association between left-behind status, screen time (ST) and behavior of autism in rural preschool children.Methods:Cross section study was used in this study.A sample of 3 636 rural preschool children aged from 3 to 6 years old in 26 kindergartens were selected from four counties in Anhui province of China.The contents of the questionnaire include: basic information questionnaire, self-made left behind status questionnaire, self-made screen time questionnaire, Clancy autism behavior scale.EpiData 3.2 and SPSS 23.0 software were used for data entry and statistical analysis.Chi-square test was used to analyze the difference of positive rate of autism behavior.Logistic regression analysis was used to further explore the relationship between left-behind status, screen time and autism behavior of rural preschool children.Results:Compared with non-left-behind children (NLBC), the risk of autism behavior for left-behind children (LBC) increased 36%.The risk of autism behavior increased by 40% for 1 h/d <ST≤ 2 h/d and 85% for ST>2 h/d when compared with ST ≤ 1 h/d.While comparing to NLBC with ST ≤ 1 h/d, the risk of autism behavior increased by 97% in LBC with 1 h/d <ST ≤2 h/d and 159% in LBC with ST>2 h/d.Conclusions:There is an additive effect on the risk of autism behavior when left-behind experience and excessive ST combined together.The daily ST should be strictly controlled within 2 h/d for NLBC, and within 1 h/d for LBC in order to reduce the risk of autism behavior in preschool children of rural areas.