We seek children who are of Black/African descent with suspected ASD or a community diagnosis of ASD, including Afro-Caribbean, Afro-Latino and Bi-racial Black people. If your child is Black, or multiracial including Black/African ancestry, then you and your child can participate even if you are not Black.

No, we don’t ask participants for any form of insurance.

Individuals aged 3 years and up are eligible to join our study. However, we also require participation from at least one biological parent.

Yes! Although we invite and encourage both parents to participate, only one biological parent is required.

We focus specifically on African Americans because their ASD presentation is different from other racial groups. African Americans are often diagnosed later in life and tend to have more severe symptoms. At a group level, intellectual disability is more common in African Americans with autism than in Caucasians with autism. We want to know whether the differences in autism symptoms and rates of intellectual disability are caused by lack of access to prompt and effective care, or whether there are biological differences between African Americans and Caucasians that contribute to different autism symptoms.