Information Avoidance and Information Seeking among Parents of Children with ASD

We estimated the effects of information avoidance and information seeking among parents of children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) on age of diagnosis. An online survey was completed by 1,815 parents of children with ASD. Children of parents who self-reported that they had preferred &...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:American journal on intellectual and developmental disabilities 2021-05, Vol.126 (3), p.249-259
Main Authors: Sicherman, Nachum, Law, Kiely, Lipkin, Paul H, Loewenstein, George, Marvin, Alison R, Buxbaum, Joseph D
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Age
Age Differences
Autism
Autism Spectrum Disorders
Autistic children
Children
Children & youth
Clinical Diagnosis
Education
Educational Attainment
Ethnicity
Families & family life
Family income
Family structure
Health care
High School Graduates
Information Seeking
Information seeking behavior
Medical diagnosis
Medical personnel
Online Surveys
Outcomes of Treatment
Parents
Parents & parenting
Pervasive Developmental Disorders
Socioeconomic Status
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:We estimated the effects of information avoidance and information seeking among parents of children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) on age of diagnosis. An online survey was completed by 1,815 parents of children with ASD. Children of parents who self-reported that they had preferred "not to know," reported diagnoses around 3 months later than other children. Children of parents who raised concerns that they perceived as having been dealt with adequately reported diagnoses about 4 months earlier, but the children of parents who reported raising concerns repeatedly and felt that those concerns were dealt with inadequately were diagnosed over a year later. These findings suggest that failure of educational and healthcare professionals, in either substituting for parents who avoid information, or supporting those who seek information, can significantly delay the age of diagnosis.
ISSN:1944-7515
1944-7558
DOI:10.1352/1944-7558-126.3.249