Executive Function and Autism

Learn about real-world executive functioning and its impacts on outcome across the lifespan in autism.

Free certificates of participation are available upon successful completion of a brief knowledge quiz at: https://www.autism.org/exeuctive-func...

Greg Wallace, PhD, is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences at The George Washington University. His research focuses on neuropsychological and structural brain development in autism spectrum disorder and other neurodevelopmental disorders across the lifespan and their impacts on real-world outcomes. He is also particularly interested in eating-related behaviors and their cognitive and neural correlates in typical and atypical (e.g., autism spectrum disorder) development. Dr. Wallace has published extensively and presented his work widely on these and related topics.

00:00 - Intro
0:38 - Speaker introduction
1:46 - Neuropsychological framework
3:28 - What is executive function (EF)
5:41 - EF demonstration
6:42 - Why do we care about EF?
7:54 - EF and autism
12:20 - Common EF challenges in autism
13:36 - Lab-based vs real-world measures
16:32 - Behavior Rating Inventory EF (BRIEF)
19:08 - Research questions
20:38 - Study 1: EF profile child/adolescent
24:11 - Study 2: EF profile young adults
26:30 - Conclusions: EF profiles in autistic children/adolescents and adults
28:52 - Study 3: Adult outcomes in autism
31:20 - Participant characteristics
32:00 - Outcome measures
35:24 - Regression methods
36:30 - Results
39:09 - Daily livings skills results
40:00 - Conclusion: EF outcomes across autistic adulthood
41:34 - Future research needs
43:26 - Summary and conclusions
44:46 - Acknowledgments
45:15 - Q & A - contact information