Dementia may be more common in older adults with intellectual disability (ID) than in the general population. The increased risk for Alzheimer's disease in people with Down syndrome (DS) is well established, but much less is known about dementia in adults with ID who do not have DS. We estimated incidence rates from a longitudinal study of…

During infant development, objects and their functions are learned by means of active exploration. Factors that may influence exploration include reaching and grasping ability, object properties and the presence of developmental disorders. We assessed the development of exploratory actions in 16 typically-developing (TD) infants and 9 infants with…

The high prevalence of sleep disorders, particularly obstructive sleep apnea, is well established in children with Down syndrome. However, only a few studies have focused on older children and young adults in this population. Given the presence of sleep disorders and the early emergence of Alzheimer's disease, more work is needed to examine the…

Persons with Down syndrome (DS) are at high risk for cardiovascular morbidity and mortality, and there is compelling evidence of autonomic dysfunction in these individuals. The main purpose of this study was to determine whether a combined aerobic and resistance exercise intervention produces similar results in cardiac autonomic function between…

Williams (WS) and Down (DS) syndromes are characterised by roughly opposing ability profiles. Relative verbal strengths and visuospatial difficulties have been reported in those with WS, while expressive language difficulties have been observed in individuals with DS. Few investigations into the executive function (EF) skills of these groups have…

Deriving the meaning of unknown words from context and its relationship to text comprehension was investigated in 24 individuals with Down syndrome and in 24 typically developing children matched for the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT) score. The study consisted of three phases. Unknown words were identified during the first phase (PPVT).…

The cognitive profile of individuals with Down syndrome (DS) is known to be characterized by an impaired executive functioning, but inhibition-related processes have not been extensively examined in this setting. The aim of the present study was to investigate whether individuals with DS have any specific or general deficit in inhibitory…

Earlier research showed that visuospatial working memory (VSWM) is better preserved in Down syndrome (DS) than verbal WM. Some differences emerged, however, when VSWM performance was broken down into its various components, and more recent studies revealed that the spatial-simultaneous component of VSWM is more impaired than the spatial-sequential…

The literature is bereft of information about the age at which infants with Down syndrome (DS) acquire motor skills and the percentage of infants that do so by the age of 12 months. Therefore, it is necessary to identify the difference in age, in relation to typical infants, at which motor skills were acquired and the percentage of infants with DS…

The aim of the present study was to investigate the prevalence of behavior problems among people with administratively defined intellectual disability (ID) and identify possible risk markers for behavior problems using the Behavior Problems Inventory (BPI). Sixty-two percent of the ID population (n = 915) had a behavior problem (self-injurious,…

The present study aimed to determine the effect of 20 weeks of whole body vibration (WBV) on the body composition of adolescents with Down syndrome (DS). Thirty adolescent with DS were divided into two groups: control and WBV. Whole body, upper and lower limbs body fat and lean body mass were measured with dual energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA)…

Based on previous findings of frequent sleep problems in children with Down syndrome (DS) and Williams syndrome (WS), the present study aimed to expand our knowledge by using parent report and actigraphy to define sleep problems more precisely in these groups. Twenty-two school-aged children with DS, 24 with WS and 52 typically developing (TD)…

Executive functions are a set of high cognitive abilities that control and regulate other functions and behaviors and are crucial for successful adaptation. Deficits in executive functions are frequently described in developmental disorders, which are characterized by disadaptive behavior. However, executive functions are not widely examined in…

The aim of this study was to assess wayfinding abilities in individuals with Down syndrome (DS). The ability to learn routes though a virtual environment (VE) and to make a novel shortcut between two locations was assessed in individuals with DS (N = 10) and control participants individually matched on mental age (MA) or chronological age (CA).…

The processing of facial expressions of emotions by 23 adults with Down syndrome and moderate intellectual disability was compared with that of adults with intellectual disability of other etiologies (24 matched in cognitive level and 26 with mild intellectual disability). Each participant performed 4 tasks of the Florida Affect Battery and an…