Autism Spectrum Screening Questionnaire (ASSQ) Test

For readers trying to understand a child’s social communication and everyday behavior, the Autism Spectrum Screening Questionnaire (ASSQ) Test offers a structured way to organize observations. As an autism screening questionnaire, it helps organize observations about communication, peer interaction, and everyday routines into a clearer profile. The result is most useful when viewed alongside the child’s broader development, context, and strengths.

What This Assessment Explores

The questionnaire examines language, social reciprocity, peer situations, routines, focused interests, movement, and everyday difficulties. As an autism traits questionnaire, it organizes observations from someone familiar with the child into a profile of reported ASD-related traits.

The displayed scale is Autism Spectrum Disorder Traits, 0-54. Results are labeled Below cutoff (0-12) or At/above cutoff (13-54). Higher scores indicate more ASD traits; scores of 13 or higher may indicate a likelihood of ASD, with reported sensitivity of 90% and a false-positive rate of 22%.

The main result groups observations into these practical areas:

• Communication and social understanding reflect language style, literal interpretation, empathy, and conversational context.
• Peer interaction reflects relationships, shared play, teamwork, and adapting to other children.
• Interests, routines, and nonverbal behavior reflect focused topics, repetition, reactions to change, gaze, movement, and coordination.

Methodology and Evidence Base

Each statement offers three ordered choices, from no presence to partial or definite presence; wording varies among “somewhat,” “partly,” and “to some extent.” Because items describe behavior and everyday difficulties, interpretation depends on who knows the child and which setting they have in mind.

In practice, an ASSQ screening tool combines responses into one displayed total. A high result indicates more endorsed ASD-related traits, but it does not establish a diagnosis; developmental history, strengths, context, and alternative explanations still matter.

The evidence base is the published Autism Spectrum Screening Questionnaire (ASSQ) described by Ehlers, Gillberg, and Wing (1999). This online questionnaire is conceptually consistent with that instrument, not a documented adaptation or independently normed version. Posserud, Lundervold, and Gillberg (2009) examined ASSQ validation, while Posserud and colleagues (2008) studied its factor structure. Their findings support related domains, but do not automatically establish norms or diagnostic accuracy for this online version.

Responses can reflect memory, expectations, current stress, and differences between home and school. Compare results with concrete examples across settings.