Maternal interactive behaviours in parenting children with Williams Syndrome and Autism Spectrum Disorder: Relations with emotional/behavioural problems

This study compared maternal responsiveness to children with two neurodevelopmental disorders sharing different but, in some cases, overlapping social phenotypesWilliams syndrome (WS) and autism spectrum disorder (ASD)and explored the relations between maternal responsiveness and child emotional/behavioural problems (EBP). The sample included 16 pre-schoolers with WS and 43 with ASD, and their mothers. Responsiveness was assessed during a mother-child interaction task. Mothers completed the CBCL 11/2-5, providing a measure of EBP. No significant differences emerged between groups, and most dyads were characterized by less responsive behaviours. Maternal responsiveness proved related to child developmental age, but not with EBP. These results provide further insight into the rearing environment of children with neurodevelopmental disorders, highlighting the need for early relationship-based interventions.This study was conducted within the Psychology Research Centre (PSI/01662), University of Minho, and supported by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (PTDC/PSI-PCL/101506/2008; also Grant SFRH/BPD/100994/2014 assigned to the first author), and by the Portuguese Ministry of Education and Science, Technology and Higher Education through national funds, and co-financed by FEDER through COMPETE2020 under the PT2020 Partnership Agreement (POCI-01-0145-FEDER-007653). The authors are very grateful to the students who helped in data collection and coding. Special thanks go to the children and mothers who participated in the study