Journal article
Alexithymia may explain the genetic relationship between autism and sensory sensitivity
- Abstract:
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Sensory symptoms are highly prevalent amongst autistic individuals and are now considered in the diagnostic criteria. Whilst evidence suggests a genetic relationship between autism and sensory symptoms, sensory symptoms are neither universal within autism nor unique to autism. One explanation for the heterogeneity within autism and commonality across conditions with respect to sensory symptoms, is that it is alexithymia (a condition associated with difficulties identifying and describing one’s own emotions) that has a genetic relationship with sensory symptoms, and that alexithymia commonly co-occurs with autism and with several other conditions. Using parent-reports of symptoms in a sample of adolescent twins, we sought to examine the genetic association between autism, alexithymia and sensory symptoms. Results showed that the genetic correlation between autism and sensory symptoms was not significant after controlling for alexithymia. In contrast, after controlling for variance in alexithymia explained by autism, the genetic correlation between alexithymia and sensory symptoms was significant (and the proportion of variance explained by genetic factors remained consistent after controlling for autism). These results suggest that 1) alexithymia and sensory symptoms share aetiology that is not accounted for by their association with autism and 2) that the genetic association between sensory symptoms and autism may be, in part or wholly, a product of alexithymia. Future research should seek to examine the contribution of alexithymia to sensory symptoms across other conditions.
- Publication status:
- Published
- Peer review status:
- Peer reviewed
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(Preview, Version of record, pdf, 740.8KB, Terms of use)
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- Publisher copy:
- 10.1038/s41398-025-03254-1
Authors
- Publisher:
- Springer Nature
- Journal:
- Translational Psychiatry More from this journal
- Volume:
- 15
- Issue:
- 1
- Article number:
- 75
- Publication date:
- 2025-03-05
- Acceptance date:
- 2024-12-11
- DOI:
- EISSN:
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2158-3188
- Language:
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English
- Keywords:
- Pubs id:
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2070060
- Local pid:
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pubs:2070060
- Deposit date:
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2024-12-11
Terms of use
- Copyright holder:
- Yorke et al
- Copyright date:
- 2025
- Rights statement:
- © The Author(s) 2025. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
- Licence:
- CC Attribution (CC BY)
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