The inclusion criteria for ASD and the ASP groups consisted of an age of 2 to 12 years and a disorder diagnosis, as determined by an independent child neurologist, psychiatrist or psychologist specializing in childhood developmental disabilities at BCH or at one of several other affiliated Harvard teaching hospitals. Diagnoses relied upon DSM-IV [2], Autism Diagnostic Interview, revised (ADI-R) [37] and/or Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule (ADOS) [38,39] criteria, aided by clinical history and expert team evaluation. All clinical diagnoses were made or reconfirmed within approximately one month of EEG study, thereby obviating diagnostic variation related to time from diagnosis to EEG assessment, a recently recognized important issue [40,41].
