STAAR: The Unique Class in the Basement of UConn’s Sprague Hall

Jason Crutcher will be funded through a National Science Foundation Research Traineeship (NRT) on The Science of Learning and the Art of Communication (SLAC). Congratulations, Jason! We cannot wait to see what you do!

Ashley de Marchena, PhD, Assistant Professor of psychology and neuroscience, was awarded a New Investigators Research Grant from the American Speech-Language-Hearing Foundation during the recent 2018 ASHA Convention, held November 15-17 in Boston, Massachusetts. The grant supports preliminary studies from early-career investigators. Funding will support Dr. de Marchena’s research into how children with autism make sense of the language they hear during everyday social interactions. See more info here.

Great work, Ashley!!

Dai, Y. G., et al. (in press). Language abilities in monolingual- and bilingual-exposed children with autism or other developmental disorders. Research in Autism Spectrum Disorders.

We are delighted to have receiving funding from the NIMH for a project examining Optimal Outcomes in ASD: Adult Functioning, Predictors, and Mechanisms. This study follows our prior research showing that some individuals show clear-cut Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) prior to age 5, but later lose all symptoms, and have IQ and adaptive skills that are average or higher; we also showed that they appear to be using unique brain networks to achieve this “optimal outcome” (OO).

The new research will further study this OO phenomenon in two cohorts of individuals (comparing OO to groups with ASD and typical development): (1) those we studied in our prior research as teens, and who are now young adults, using online assessments to evaluate how they navigate the difficult transition into independence and young adulthood; and (2) confirming the early presentation of ASD in children who were evaluated and diagnosed by at ages 2-4 years, and who are now in their teens, to permit the identification of early childhood predictors of OO. An MRI study of Cohort 2 will also investigate functional connectivity of specific task-engaged social and language and resting-state networks, to study whether individuals with OO show greater atypicality, specify the functional integration of the circuits involved, and to test our model of compensation.

We are hiring a post-doctoral fellow on this grant and welcome applications; please email Dr. Eigsti for further information.

https://iancommunity.org/ssc/recovery-losing-autism-diagnosis

Science of Learning Project Wins $3 Million NSF Award

Stewart, C. E., Lee, S. Y., Hogstrom, A., & Williams, M. (2017). Diversify and conquer: A call to promote minority representation in clinical psychology. The Behavior Therapist, 40(3), 74-79.

Silverman, L. B., Eigsti, I. M., & Bennetto, L. (in press). I tawt I taw a puddy tat: Gestures in Canary Row narrations by high-functioning adolescents with autism spectrum disorder. Autism Research

http://blog.research.chop.edu/frankly-dear-thats-clear-expert-qa-frank-presentations-autism/