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- Creators: Dixon, Maria
- Creators: Bimonte-Nelson, Heather A.
- Resource Type: Text
- Status: Published
Description
With a growing number of adults with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), more and more research has been conducted on majority male cohorts with ASD from young, adolescence, and some older age. Currently, males make up the majority of individuals diagnosed with ASD, however, recent research states that the gender gap is closing due to more advanced screening and a better understanding of how females with ASD present their symptoms. Little research has been published on the neurocognitive differences that exist between older adults with ASD compared to neurotypical (NT) counterparts, and nothing has specifically addressed older women with ASD. This study utilized neuroimaging and neuropsychological tests to examine differences between diagnosis and sex of four distinct groups: older men with ASD, older women with ASD, older NT men, and older NT women. In each group, hippocampal size (via FreeSurfer) was analyzed for differences as well as correlations with neuropsychological tests. Participants (ASD Female, n = 12; NT Female, n = 14; ASD Male, n = 30; NT Male = 22), were similar according to age, IQ, and education. The results of the study indicated that the ASD Group as a whole performed worse on executive functioning tasks (Wisconsin Card Sorting Test, Trails Making Test) and memory-related tasks (Rey Auditory Verbal Learning Test, Weschler Memory Scale: Visual Reproduction) compared to the NT Group. Interactions of sex by diagnosis approached significance only within the WCST non-perseverative errors, with the women with ASD performing worse than NT women, but no group differences between men. Effect sizes between the female groups (ASD female vs. NT female) showed more than double that of the male groups (ASD male vs. NT male) for all WCST and AVLT measures. Participants with ASD had significantly smaller right hippocampal volumes than NT participants. In addition, all older women showed larger hippocampal volumes when corrected for total intracranial volume (TIV) compared to all older men. Overall, NT Females had significant correlations across all neuropsychological tests and their hippocampal volumes whereas no other group had significant correlations. These results suggest a tighter coupling between hippocampal size and cognition in NT Females than NT Males and both sexes with ASD. This study promotes further understanding of the neuropsychological differences between older men and women, both with and without ASD. Further research is needed on a larger sample of older women with and without ASD.
ContributorsWebb, Christen Len (Author) / Braden, B. Blair (Thesis advisor) / Azuma, Tamiko (Committee member) / Dixon, Maria (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2019
Description
The present series of studies examined whether a novel implementation of an
intermittent restraint (IR) chronic stress paradigm could be used to investigate hippocampal-dependent spatial ability in both sexes. In experiments 1 and 2, Sprague- Dawley male rats were used to identify the optimal IR parameters to assess spatial ability. For IR, rats were restrained for 2 or 6hrs/day (IR2, IR6, respectively) for five days and then given two days off, a process that was repeated for three weeks and compared to rats restrained for 6hrs/d for each day (DR6) and non-stressed controls (CON). Spatial memory was tested on the radial arm water maze (RAWM), object placement (OP), novel object recognition (NOR) and Y-maze. The results for the first two experiments revealed that IR6, but not IR2, was effective in impairing spatial memory in male rats and that task order impacted performance. In experiment 3, an extended IR paradigm for six weeks was implemented before spatial memory testing commenced in male and female rats (IR- M, IR-F). Unexpectedly, an extended IR paradigm failed to impair spatial memory in either males or females, suggesting that when extended, the IR paradigm may have become predictable. In experiment 4, an unpredictable IR (UIR) paradigm was implemented, in which restraint duration (30 or 60-min) combined with orbital shaking, time of day, and the days off from UIR were varied. UIR impaired spatial memory in males, but not females. Together with other reports, these findings support the interpretation that chronic stress negatively impairs hippocampal-dependent function in males, but not females, and that females appear to be resilient to spatial memory deficits in the face of chronic stress.
intermittent restraint (IR) chronic stress paradigm could be used to investigate hippocampal-dependent spatial ability in both sexes. In experiments 1 and 2, Sprague- Dawley male rats were used to identify the optimal IR parameters to assess spatial ability. For IR, rats were restrained for 2 or 6hrs/day (IR2, IR6, respectively) for five days and then given two days off, a process that was repeated for three weeks and compared to rats restrained for 6hrs/d for each day (DR6) and non-stressed controls (CON). Spatial memory was tested on the radial arm water maze (RAWM), object placement (OP), novel object recognition (NOR) and Y-maze. The results for the first two experiments revealed that IR6, but not IR2, was effective in impairing spatial memory in male rats and that task order impacted performance. In experiment 3, an extended IR paradigm for six weeks was implemented before spatial memory testing commenced in male and female rats (IR- M, IR-F). Unexpectedly, an extended IR paradigm failed to impair spatial memory in either males or females, suggesting that when extended, the IR paradigm may have become predictable. In experiment 4, an unpredictable IR (UIR) paradigm was implemented, in which restraint duration (30 or 60-min) combined with orbital shaking, time of day, and the days off from UIR were varied. UIR impaired spatial memory in males, but not females. Together with other reports, these findings support the interpretation that chronic stress negatively impairs hippocampal-dependent function in males, but not females, and that females appear to be resilient to spatial memory deficits in the face of chronic stress.
ContributorsPeay, Dylan (Author) / Conrad, Cheryl D. (Thesis advisor) / Bimonte-Nelson, Heather A. (Committee member) / Wynne, Clive (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2019
Description
This pilot study evaluated whether Story Champs and Puente de Cuentos helped bilingual preschoolers increase their usage of emotional terms and ability to tell stories. Participants in this study included 10 Spanish-English bilingual preschoolers. Intervention was conducted in 9 sessions over 3 days using the Test of Narrative Retell to measure results. Results did not find significant gains in either emotional term usage or ability to tell stories, but the results were promising as a pilot study.
ContributorsSato, Leslie Mariko (Author) / Restrepo, Maria (Thesis director) / Dixon, Maria (Committee member) / Department of Speech and Hearing Science (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-05