Autism Spectrum Disorder Archives | Research & Innovation

Psychology prof co-lead in $1.8 million government funded program

muellerm — Tue, 03 Sep 2013 08:00:00 +0000

91��ɫ psychology Professor Jonathan Weiss is one of the co-leads in a research program that was recently awarded $1.8 million over three years from the Ontario Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care’s Health System Research Fund.

The program, Health Care Access Research in Developmental Disabilities (H-CARDD), aims to enhance the overall health and wellbeing of individuals with developmental disabilities through improved health-care policy and services.

H-CARDD is directed by Yona Lunsky from the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences and the University of Toronto. Weiss, the Chair in Autism Spectrum Disorders Treatment and Care Research in 91��ɫ’s Faculty of Health, is a member of the program’s core team, which includes scientists, clinicians and policymakers from across Ontario.

Jonathan Weiss

Individuals with developmental disabilities are one of the most vulnerable and marginalized populations when it comes to accessing healthcare. The goal of H-CARDD is to reduce disparities in health outcomes of Ontarians with developmental disabilities.

Four vulnerable subgroups will be examined over the next three years. The four subgroups are as follows:

Aging Adults with co-leads Lynn Martin of Lakehead University and Hélène Ouellette-Kuntz of Queen's University
Women with co-leads Virginie Cobigo of the University of Ottawa and Simone Vigod of Women’s College Hospital.
Youth Transitioning to Adult Services with Weiss and Barry Isaacs of Surrey Place Centre
Individuals with “Dual Diagnosis” with Rob Balogh of the University of Ontario Institute of Technology and Elizabeth Lin of the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health.

Researchers already know that youth with developmental disabilities visit emergency rooms more often than others and have higher rates of psychiatric hospitalization than youth without disabilities. What is needed is more research at the individual and system level on the factors that lead to these high rates and that is what Weiss and Isaacs will be doing.

Young people with developmental disabilities have difficulty in transitioning into adult health care services. For those who need mental health services, it is even more difficult especially with an already difficult to navigate health-care system. That can lead to a worsening of issues.

“Understanding patterns of service use as adolescents with developmental disabilities transition into adulthood can help us to identify barriers and gaps in the health service system,” says Weiss. “Doing so can lead to improved primary care and addressing problems before they become severe.”

H-CARDD’s program of research will provide new information that profiles vulnerable developmental disability subgroups and will translate research into action by facilitating the uptake of evidence-based practices in primary and emergency care.

H-CARDD’s partners include the Ontario Ministry of Community and Social Services, the Ontario Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care, the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences, Surrey Place Centre, the University of Toronto, the University of Ottawa, Queen’s University, 91��ɫ, Lakehead University, Sunnybrook Hospital, and Women’s College Hospital.

For more information about the H-CARDD program, contact Julie Klein-Geltink, H-CARDD manager, at julie.kleingeltink@camh.ca.

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91��ɫ hosts a new knowledge translation group

muellerm — Tue, 20 Aug 2013 08:00:00 +0000

91��ɫ’s Knowledge Mobilization (KMb)��Unit��has joined forces with NeuroDevNet, a Network of Centres of Excellence (NCE), to provide knowledge translation (KT) leadership and services within the University of British Columbia-based network.

��“91��ɫ’s Knowledge Mobilization Unit is continuing to make an impact by supporting transformative research through knowledge translation,” said Robert Haché (left), 91��ɫ’s vice-president research & innovation. “We are proud of the important work 91��ɫ’s leading KMb Unit is providing to NeuroDevNet, and warmly welcome the new members of the knowledge translation team.”

“For seven years, 91��ɫ's Knowledge Mobilization Unit has been providing professional knowledge mobilization services to 91��ɫ's researchers, students and their partners to maximize the economic, social and environmental impacts of research," said David Phipps (right), executive director, research & information services at 91��ɫ. "I am delighted to be the knowledge translation lead for NeuroDevNet and provide services to accelerate the impact of their research and training programs on the lives of children and families living with neurodevelopmental disorders."��

Anneliese Poetz, NeuroDevNet��knowledge translation manager, and Matt Calverley,��knowledge translation coordinator, are being hosted in 91��ɫ's KMb Unit, in suite 201, Kaneff Tower, as of this month.

“This is an exciting development for NeuroDevNet,” says Dan Goldowitz, the organization's scientific director. “With NeuroDevNet moving strongly towards a translational phase, we are going to have many great stories to tell and then move toward important outcomes. The expertise present at 91��ɫ’s Knowledge Mobilization Unit and our new KT lead, David Phipps, is hugely welcome and the network members are enthusiastically looking towards engagement with his team.”

NeuroDevNet is in its fourth year as an NCE, and has drawn together world-class researchers and clinicians across the country with expertise in three initial areas of focus, in autism spectrum disorder, fetal alcohol spectrum disorder and cerebral palsy.��Translation of research into practice and commercial ventures, as well as engagement with policy makers, are key elements of the NCE mission.��Knowledge translation is a central pillar of the NeuroDevNet initiative, funded for an initial period of five years by the NCE and Industry Canada through the Tri-Councils.

One in six Canadian children is affected by a brain-based developmental disorder. “NeuroDevNet exists to help these children and their families overcome the challenges that stem from neurodevelopmental conditions,” adds Goldowitz. “NeuroDevNet’s research is making important strides towards that objective. I am confident our new KT team will help ensure our findings reach stakeholders who share our commitment and can put that knowledge into action.”

For more information, visit the website.

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Youth with autism face higher rates of bullying, says study of parents

fmaquito — Tue, 28 Feb 2012 10:00:00 +0000

Youth with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) experience higher rates of bullying, which��are��associated with a higher incidence of mental health issues, according to a study in the Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders this month by 91��ɫ researchers.

“Very little research has been done to assess the relationship between bullying and mental health in youth with ASD. It’s always been suspected there was a link, but this study confirms that,” says 91��ɫ Psychology Professor Jonathan Weiss, lead researcher of the study and co-author of the article, along with Debra Pepler, Distinguished Research Professor in Psychology, and first author M. Catherine Cappadocia, PhD candidate in clinical-developmental psychology.

M. Catherine Cappadocia

“In the study, those youth with ASD who experienced little or no victimization, less than two or three times in the past month, compared to those victimized at least once a week, exhibited less anxiety, self-injury and over-sensitive behaviours,” says Cappadocia.��She, Weiss and Pepler, who is scientific co-director of the Promoting Relationships��& Eliminating Violence Network (), are all��members of��91��ɫ’s Faculty of Health.

In “”, the researchers surveyed 192 parents whose children, between the ages of five and 21 and enrolled in elementary or secondary school up to Grade 12, had been diagnosed with ASD. The authors examined the parents’ reports of victimization, along with the association between the rate of victimization experienced and mental health issues. Seventy-five per cent reported their child with ASD had been bullied within the last month at school, 23 per cent reported victimization two or three times, 13 per cent reported victimization once a week and 30 per cent two or more time a week. Fifty per cent of the youth with ASD had experienced victimization for more than a year, and that can lead to anxiety, depression, self-injury, hyperactivity, over-sensitivity and a lower self-concept, says Cappadocia.

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Jonathan Weiss

“It’s one of the first studies to look at bullying in youth with ASD. It’s important as it shines a light on youth with ASD and victimization,” says Weiss. “I think it really highlights that chronic victimization is common for some of these youth. A large percentage of the youth in this study experience chronic victimization. Those are the youth that have significantly more mental health concerns.” In addition, he says, one in 110 children has been diagnosed with ASD. “It’s one of the most common identifications in the school system.”

One factor that puts youth with ASD at risk for victimization is when they have more difficulty being assertive and making friends at school. They often lack social and pragmatic skills, and their parents may be less empowered to effect change as a result of the number of major stresses in their lives. “These are a lot of the same factors that are found in the general population of kids that are bullied,” says Weiss. “What really stands out in this study is the association with these risk factors.”

A lack of friends is a significant risk factor for bullying even in the general population and leaves these children unprotected by their peers. That means no one is going to stand up for them when someone starts to bully them. “Eighty-five per cent of the time when bullying happens, peers are watching,” says Cappadocia. “If a peer stands up, 50 per cent of the time the bullying stops. Peer support makes a huge difference and represents a robust protective factor these kids are missing.”

��Debra Pepler

Youth with ASD may also be more vulnerable because they lack the skills needed to react effectively to victimization when it does occur. “When children with ASD are targeted, there can be a more intense behavioural reaction, which may encourage the child who is bullying to continue,” she says. “If a child with ASD has a strong emotional or behavioural reaction, the bullying can become chronic, especially if peers tend to jump in and encourage the child who is bullying. It can keep escalating.”

Weiss, Pepler and Cappadocia all do clinical work in addition to research. In her clinical work, Cappadocia frequently sees youth with ASD who have been bullied. “Part of the interest in pursuing this particular research came from being interested clinically in how to help these children.”

The next step is to find interventions to help these children and their classmates, which would then translate to the general population, says Weiss. He is looking to run groups at 91��ɫ next year for youth with ASD who experience bullying, which will look at all facets of the problem, from peers, the school, their family, as well as the child.

He is also interested in looking at what makes some youth with ASD, who’ve been victimized, resilient. He’ll be examining what the peer, family and school relations are like, and why they may buffer the potential mental health impact of victimization.

Cappadocia received support through the Provincial Centre of Excellence for Child & Youth Mental Health at CHEO Graduate Award and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research Frederick Banting and Charles Best Canada Graduate Scholarships Doctoral Award. Weiss was supported by a New Investigator Fellowship from the Ontario Mental Health Foundation, while Pepler was supported by Networks of Centres of Excellence through its support of PREVNet.

For more information, visit the website.

By Sandra McLean, YFile writer

Republished courtesy of YFile– 91��ɫ’s daily e-bulletin.

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Professor Jonathan Weiss receives new researcher award

fmaquito — Wed, 21 Sep 2011 08:00:00 +0000

91��ɫ psychology Professor Jonathan Weiss (MA '02, PhD ’07) has recently been awarded a Canadian Psychological Association (CPA)��President’s New Researcher Award in recognition of his contribution to psychological knowledge in Canada.

The award is, in part, based on the researcher’s record of early career achievement. For Weiss, that encompasses the research on developmental disabilities that he’s conducted over the last three or more��years. He is one of two recipients of the award this year, handed out by the CPA.

Right: Jonathan Weiss

“The award is really recognition for the type of research I’ve been able to do prior to and since beginning at 91��ɫ,” says Weiss, a clinical psychologist in 91��ɫ’s Department of Psychology, Faculty of Health. “It’s been great to be recognized by psychologists, not just in the field of��developmental disabilities, but by colleagues from other fields.”

He is co-investigator for three Canadian Institutes of Health Research-funded projects, two of which look at children with developmental disabilities and the third at understanding pathways to emergency health care for adolescents and adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder.

Weiss also received a three-year New Investigator Fellowship from the Ontario Mental Health Foundation in 2010 to study people with developmental disabilities, who make up between one and��three per cent of the Canadian population. At least one in three people with developmental disabilities will have mental health problems or serious challenging behaviours as an adolescent or young adult, says Weiss.

His goal for this project is to learn what leads a young person with developmental disability to have mental health problems, and how it is related to their service use, their skills, academic success and family functioning.

For more information about the President’s New Researcher Award, visit the website.

Republished courtesy of YFile– 91��ɫ’s daily e-bulletin.

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