DSE is considered a condition of early childhood and while recent evidence suggests that DSE can persist into later childhood and adolescence,15-18 little is known about its long-term persistence into adulthood.19 To address this point, we have recently reported childhood-to-adult developmental trajectories for DSE behaviours in the English and Romanian study cohort 20 of individuals who suffered extreme early deprivation in the institutions of the latter years of the Ceaușescu regime, before adoption into UK families.5 Perhaps against expectation, DSE behaviours showed strong persistence into adulthood alongside more expected persistence of ASD and inattention/overactivity (I/OA; representing a subset of symptoms of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder) symptoms– 35% of young adult adoptees who experienced deprivation for longer than the first 6 months of life displayed evidence of DSE behaviours compared to 6% in a comparison group of UK adoptees. In the current paper, we extend this initial analysis of the persistence of DSE behaviours. Our aim is to address the following questions. What are the characteristic features of the young adult DSE presentation in individuals who have suffered early deprivation? Can DSE behaviours still be directly observed? To what extent are affected adults aware of their own DSE behaviours? Do DSE behaviours overlap with continuing neuro-developmental disorders? Does young adult DSE impact social functioning, mental health, service use, and quality of life (QoL)? Given prior findings we predicted that DSE behaviours would persist into adulthood but be less observable than at younger ages and affected individuals would show some awareness of their own tendency towards DSE. We also predicted that DSE behaviours would be associated with impaired social functioning and reduced QoL.
DSE is considered a condition of early childhood and while recent evidence suggests that DSE can persist into later childhood and adolescence,15-18 little is known about its long-term persistence into adulthood.19 To address this point, we have recently reported childhood-to-adult developmental trajectories for DSE behaviours in the English and Romanian study cohort 20 of individuals who suffered extreme early deprivation in the institutions of the latter years of the Ceaușescu regime, before adoption into UK families.5 Perhaps against expectation, DSE behaviours showed strong persistence into adulthood alongside more expected persistence of ASD and inattention/overactivity (I/OA; representing a subset of symptoms of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder) symptoms– 35% of young adult adoptees who experienced deprivation for longer than the first 6 months of life displayed evidence of DSE behaviours compared to 6% in a comparison group of UK adoptees. In the current paper, we extend this initial analysis of the persistence of DSE behaviours. Our aim is to address the following questions. What are the characteristic features of the young adult DSE presentation in individuals who have suffered early deprivation? Can DSE behaviours still be directly observed? To what extent are affected adults aware of their own DSE behaviours? Do DSE behaviours overlap with continuing neuro-developmental disorders? Does young adult DSE impact social functioning, mental health, service use, and quality of life (QoL)? Given prior findings we predicted that DSE behaviours would persist into adulthood but be less observable than at younger ages and affected individuals would show some awareness of their own tendency towards DSE. We also predicted that DSE behaviours would be associated with impaired social functioning and reduced QoL.