The brains of children who have autism spectrum disorders is greater than those of other children, a difference that seems to arise prior to 2 years, according to a new study.
In 2005, researchers from the University of Chapel Hill North Carolina found that children 2 years of autism had brains up to 10 percent more than the other children of the same age. This new study shows that children with brains extended to 2 years of age continued to have enlarged brains to 4-5 years, but not exceeding the amount at the age of 2 years.
"Enlargement resulting from brain of folding on the surface of the brain is probably genetic in origin, and the result of an increase in the proliferation of neurons in the brain developing countries," study researcher Heather Cody Hazlett, Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the UNCsaid in a news release.
Hazlett and his colleagues conducted behavioral assessments and magnetic resonance (MRI) imaging analysis on 97 children at the age of 2, including 59 had received a diagnosis of autism.
About two years later, she and her colleagues repeated children these same tests were still at their disposal: diagnosis of 57 in total, of which 36 had a spectrum of autism.
The researchers found that children with autism spectrum disorder had larger volume of brain (including most of white and grey matter) at all ages than children without autism. However, the rate of growth of brain was similar to the rate observed in children with autism.
Research has shown that the proliferation of brain occurs in the latter part of the first year of life, and the new finding shows that there is a link between the onset of autism and invaded brain behavior, the study said.
"It is possible that invaded brain resulted directly in the development of autistic behavior, perhaps by a physical disturbance of neuronal circuits," wrote the researchers.
Their study appears in the May 2011 issue of Archives of General Psychiatry.
Pass it: The brains of children with autism is larger than children without the condition.
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