The Centers for Disease Control has released the 2012 Community Report from the Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring (ADDM) Network. Within the report, the CDC outlines the prevalence of Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASDs)among multiple areas of the United States.
The ADDM issued several key findings within the study including:
- More children were diagnosed at earlier ages—a growing number of them by 3 years of age. Still, most children were not diagnosed until after they were 4 years of age. On average, diagnosis was a bit earlier for children with autistic disorder (4 years) than for children with the more broadly defined autism spectrum diagnoses or pervasive developmental disorder not otherwise specified (4 years, 5 months), and diagnosis was much later for children with Asperger disorder (6 years, 3 months).
- Five times as many boys were being identified with ASDs as girls (1 in 54 compared to 1 in 252).
- The largest increases over time were among Hispanic and Black children.
- The majority (62%) of children the ADDM Network identified as having ASDs did not have intellectual disability. The largest increases during 2002 to 2008 were among children without intellectual disability (those having IQ scores higher than 70), although there were increases in the identified prevalence of ASDs at all levels of intellectual ability.
