Trial reportJournal of child psychology and psychiatry, and allied disciplines2022
Sleeping Sound Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD): a randomised controlled trial of a brief behavioural sleep intervention in primary school-aged autistic children.
Trial report in Journal of child psychology and psychiatry, and allied disciplines, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 8 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
8 citing papers in PubMed, 40 citations in OpenAlex.
- Sleeping Sound Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD): Cost-Effectiveness of a Brief Behavioural Sleep Intervention in Primary School-Aged Autistic Children.Journal of autism and developmental disorders · 2025Trial
- Excitation/Inhibition Balance as a Mechanistic Link Between Sleep Disturbance and Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Bidirectional Framework.Alpha psychiatry · 2026Review
- Comparative efficacy and acceptability of sleep interventions for children and adolescents with autism spectrum disorders: a protocol for a systematic review and network meta-analysis.Systematic reviews · 2026Article
- Behavioral Sleep Interventions for Neurodivergent Youth: A Narrative Review.Current sleep medicine reports · 2026Review
- Exploring Occupational Therapists' Sleep Intervention Approaches and Perspectives for Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Malaysian Qualitative Study.Occupational therapy international · 2026Article
- Scoping Review of Socio-Ecological Factors Contributing to Sleep Health Disparities in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder.Journal of autism and developmental disorders · 2025Article
- Relationship Between Health-Related Behaviors and Family Quality of Life in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder.Journal of autism and developmental disorders · 2025Article
- The impact of COVID-19 on sleep for autistic children: A systematic review.Research in autism spectrum disorders · 2023Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
12 authors at 4 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundBehavioural sleep problems are common in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD); however, evidence for the efficacy of behavioural sleep interventions is limited. This study examined the efficacy of a brief behavioural sleep intervention in autistic children. It was hypothesised that the intervention would reduce overall child sleep problems (primary outcome), in addition to improvements in children's social, emotional, cognitive, academic functioning, and quality of life, and parent/caregivers' stress, quality of life, and mental health (secondary outcomes).
methodsA randomised controlled trial was conducted with participants randomised via a computer-generated sequence to the sleeping sound intervention (n = 123) or treatment as usual (n = 122) group. Participants comprised 245 children with an ASD diagnosis. Inclusion criteria were as follows: confirmation of DSM IV or DSM-5 diagnosis of ASD, participants aged between 5 and 13 years and parent/caregiver report of moderate-severe sleep problems. Exclusion criteria were as follows: parent/caregiver intellectual disability or lacking sufficient English to complete questionnaires; and child participant with co-occurring medical conditions known to impact sleep. The intervention group received the sleeping sound intervention (2 × 50-min face-to-face sessions plus follow-up phone call) by a trained clinician.
resultsChange in children's sleep problems was measured by the Children's Sleep Habits Questionnaire (CSHQ) at 3 months post randomisation. Parents/caregivers of children in the intervention group reported a reduction in child sleep problems at 3 months post randomisation (effect size: E.S -0.7). There were also small effects in a number of child (internalising symptoms, emotional behavioural disturbance and quality of life) and parent/caregiver (mental health, parenting stress and quality of life) outcomes; however, these did not remain significant when controlling for multiple comparisons.
conclusionsThe sleeping sound ASD intervention is an efficacious and practical way to reduce sleep problems for autistic children. This brief behavioural intervention has the potential to be embedded easily into the Australian healthcare system.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.