The aim of an autism screening questionnaire is to help parents and doctors come to a decision on whether the child must be further evaluated for autism or not.
Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) refers to developmental disorders that affect social development, language skills, and behavioral traits in children. Maximum cases have reported diagnosis of the condition in children under 3 years of age.
An outcome of several genetic and environmental factors, this disorder has no cure, as yet. However, early diagnosis, and prompt therapy makes a great difference in the lives and overall development of most children, paving a way for a better quality of life.
Given below is an autism screening questionnaire, designed to identify the presence of an ASD.
Questions Designed for An Autism Spectrum Screening
For parents, more important than knowing about the questions, is knowing about the stages in the process. As we move further in this article, we would come across the various proceedings which are involved in this assessment. These stages focus on the child’s social skills, language power, and behavioral aspects.
Social Skills
When it comes to evaluating the social skills of an affected child, the questionnaire here would help experts to understand the autistic characteristics of the child, based on his social talents or abilities. The possible questions which parents might come across here may include:
- Whether the child faces any trouble in making eye contact, using various gestures, or coming up with facial expressions? Or, is the child able to make use of non-verbal gestures, which are common in social interaction?
- Does the child show any kind of interest in socializing with other kids, which is necessary for making friends?
- Does the child show any interest in expressing his emotions or interests with his/her parents or others?
- Does the child show signs of sympathy?
Language Skills
Coming to language, the questionnaire would help assess the communication skills of the child. The following questions may be asked:
- Has the child started talking before or later than 2 years of age?
- Did the child exhibit any kind of development delay by 30 months?
- Can the child begin a conversation, and keep up with it?
- If the child is able to use words which are correct, then is he/she able to use such words in the right context?
- Does the child imitate the parents’ behavior or actions during play time?
Behavior Skills
Testing behavior skills, exhibits the child’s reaction towards different changes around him/her. This can be assessed through the following questions:
- If any activity like a magic show, drama, etc., is being conducted in the school, does the child develop any interest in the event?
- Has the child developed a monotonous behavior? Typical example can be humming the same tune over and over, or hand flapping, etc.
- What is the child’s reaction when changes are introduced in the usual routine? For instance, the experts would try to evaluate, with the help of parents, if the child gets disturbed or stressed if his play time or meal time is changed by a slight degree.
Some More Questions
- Does the child react upon calling his/her name?
- Does the baby make smiling gestures?
- Does the child show any signs of being upset when you leave him/her alone? Does he/she reacts when you come back?
- Does the baby point to objects, which are typically amusing?
- Does the baby try to look at a direction or object that you are pointing at?
- Is the baby able to crawl, walk or develop the motor skills which should have been developed by his/her age?
An autism screening questionnaire may have many more questions depending on the symptoms and areas of developmental delay exhibited by the child. In case if the slightest doubt autistic behavior, it is mandatory to seek professional consultation.
Disclaimer: This HealthHearty article is for informative purposes only, and should not be used as a substitute for professional medical advice.
