The Beach Center Family Quality of Life Scale (Beach Center FQOL) is used to evaluate and develop family-centered intervention services. However, its use with families of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and in non-English speaking populations requires further investigation. The present study sought to assess the psychometric properties of a French translation of this scale on 452 parents of children aged 5 and under who were recently diagnosed with ASD. The resulting Satisfaction and Importance scales presented excellent internal consistency at the scale level and acceptable internal consistency at the subscale level. Theoretical model positing 5 dimensions of FQOL generally fit the data acceptably. Satisfaction ratings were found to be sensitive to changes and were negatively correlated with parenting stress.

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This proof-of-concept study assessed the feasibility of implementing Prevent-Teach-Reinforce-for-Young-Children (PTR-YC) program to address challenging behaviors in children with autism within the context of public, specialized early intensive behavioral intervention (EIBI) services offered in community settings. Following a two-day training and with brief weekly supervision meetings, children's EIBI educators acted as facilitators in 35 families' home environments. Small and moderate effect sizes were observed for parents' appraisals of their children's behavior and self-reported parenting stress. Recruitment and retention rates, implementation fidelity, as well as treatment acceptability from the perspective of participating parents and the organization attested to the feasibility and relevance of implementing and evaluating this program on a larger scale as part of a multi-center randomized controlled trial.

Cluster Analysis Neurodevelopmental Disorders Cluster Analysis of Clinical Features of Children Suspected to Have Neurodevelopmental DisordersEarly identification of neurodevelopmental disabilities (NDDs), such as autism spectrum disorder (ASD), intellectual disability (ID), global development disorder (GDD) and specific learning and communication disorders, is critical for the prognosis of children and the well-being of their family because a formal diagnostic label is often required to access early intervention and support (Guralnick, 2019;Johnson et al., 2007;Lipkin et al., 2020). Together, NDDs are observed in up to 10% of children (NICE, 2019). Their prevalence has increased continuously over the last decades, which translates into a growing demand for evaluation and intervention and, consequently, delays to access adequate services (see Rivard et al., 2021a). In parallel, both the scientific literature and practice settings have questioned the validity of diagnostic evaluation processes that rely exclusively on category-based systems as the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DMS-5; American Psychiatric Association (APA), 2013) to capture the heterogeneity of needs in the NDD population (Astle et al., 2021). Similarly, there has been growing concern about the appropriateness of exclusively diagnosis-based service provision systems, where a diagnosis is required to access interventions and there is little latitude to individualize supports according to the diverse needs and clinical profiles (e.g., co-occurring conditions) within a given NDD (Astle et al., 2021; Miller et al., 2016). These systems pose challenges for families' prompt access to adequate services that are attributable to 1) delays in obtaining diagnosis from qualified specialists; 2) complex clinical profiles or the presence of delays or atypicality that fail to meet diagnostic thresholds or do not find within a discrete diagnostic category; 3) heterogeneous profiles (in terms of symptom severity or variety of co-occurring conditions) and, thus, clinical needs within the same 2 Cluster Analysis Neurodevelopmental Disorders diagnosis; 4) shared service needs among families who are nevertheless placed on different service trajectory due to their child's different NDD diagnosis. These concerns have led to the suggestion that children's functional characteristics (e.g., adaptive and social behavior, learning or academic achievement, and cognitive functioning) may better explain child and family outcomes than the diagnosis itself, and that grouping or categorizing children on the basis of these characteristics (and, thus, needs) would better support service provision in NDDs (Astle et al., 2021; Kushi et al., 2019; Miller et al., 2016). The present study sought to address some of these issues and contribute to the advancement of our understanding of clinically meaningful subgroups that may exist across NDDs, beyond diagnostic labels. To do so, it employed a datadriven approach (i.e., cluster analysis), based on eight behavi...