Neurodevelopment in Young Children With Sex Chromosome Trisomies Diagnosed Before Birth: A Cluster Analysis Study

Many studies have investigated the neuropsychological profile of individuals with sex chromosome trisomies (SCTs) and have identified some fragilities in language development within a wide individual variability. However, only a few studies have focused on children in the second year of life (12-24 months), a crucial stage for neurodevelopment. The present study aimed to identify and describe neurodevelopmental patterns in young children with SCTs. Seventy children with SCTs, ranging in age from 14 to 29 months, were administered the Griffiths Mental Development Scales, and their different neurodevelopmental profiles were identified using cluster analysis. Two-step cluster analysis highlighted two profiles of children equally distributed between groups. The two clusters showed a similar pattern but different levels of functioning, with children in Cluster 1 showing a lower performance in all the areas considered than children in Cluster 2. However, in both clusters, all the mean scores were in the normative range, with a significant gap in the linguistic area. Identifying the subgroups of young children with SCTs at higher risk can contribute to developing early monitoring protocols and targeted therapy approaches.