IAN Elopement and Wandering Study Published
Date Last Revised:
July 7, 2016
Date Published:
October 8, 2012
A study published October 8, 2012 in the journal Pediatrics (Epub ahead of print) found that nearly half of children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) are reported to wander or bolt, and more than half of these children go missing. Led by researchers from the Interactive Autism Network (IAN), the nation's largest online autism research initiative and a project of the Kennedy Krieger Institute, this study provides the most comprehensive estimate of elopement occurrence in a United States community-based sample of more than 1,200 children with ASD.
Read the abstract or the article (for subscribers only) in Pediatrics.
See the coverage in The New York Times.
Explore the data. (Select Elopement and Wandering Questionnaire from the list.)
Additional Resources:
- The Big Red Safety Box - a set of elopement/wandering-related resources from the National Autism Assocation
- AWAARE Collaboration - working to prevent wandering incidents and deaths in the autism community
- AWAARE Collaboration's Social Stories addressing Wandering
- Autism Speaks' Autism Safety Project
- Autism Society of America's Take Me Home program
- Project Lifesaver - provides in-depth training regarding wandering behavior and tracking technologies to law enforcement agencies
- Examples of services available to help locate loved ones via "tracking" devices: EmFinders, LoJack SafetyNet, Care Trak