Data from the Baby Siblings Research Consortium confirm and specify the nature of the female protective effect in autism: A commentary on Messinger et al.

Sibling recurrence data from the Baby Siblings Research Consortium (BSRC) recapitulate results from very large clinical family studies that demonstrate the absence of the Carter effect and provide clarification of the nature of the female protective effect in ASD. This legacy prospective data collection confirmed marked differences in the proportions of males versus females who lie along deviant trajectories of social development in the setting of inherited liability to autism—a phenomenon which defines the female protective effect—and demonstrate that among affected children, sex differences are modest and homologous to those observed among non-ASD children.