{
  "abstract": "Early autism screening is essential for timely intervention but remains constrained by specialist dependence, costly protocols, and limited accessibility. We present Autism-CLIP, a vision-language model that automates screening from 3-min naturalistic caregiver-child interaction videos recorded in toddlers aged 15-24 months. By integrating contrastive learning, large language model-generated supervision, domain-specific architecture, and hybrid training, Autism-CLIP aligns visual behavioral cues with autism-related assessment outcomes, enabling annotation-free inference. In multicenter evaluation, Autism-CLIP achieved an AUC of 0.903 in the internal cohort (n = 103) and 0.873 in the external cohort (n = 102), outperforming conventional machine learning methods. Attention mapping highlighted clinically relevant markers, including gaze aversion and limited social reciprocity. Requiring only smartphone-captured videos without manual coding or controlled settings, Autism-CLIP offers a scalable, low-cost approach to broaden access to early autism screening and support prioritization of clinical resources.",
  "abstract_shown": true,
  "affiliations": [
    "College of Computer Science and Technology, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China.",
    "School of Medicine, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China.",
    "Child Developmental and Behavioral Center, Third Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, China.",
    "Child Developmental and Behavioral Center, Zhaoqing Hospital of the Third Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University, Zhaoqing, China.",
    "Child Developmental and Behavioral Center, Third Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, China. denghzh@mail.sysu.edu.cn.",
    "Child Developmental and Behavioral Center, Zhaoqing Hospital of the Third Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University, Zhaoqing, China. denghzh@mail.sysu.edu.cn.",
    "College of Computer Science and Technology, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China. zhengxinghuang@zju.edu.cn."
  ],
  "article_type": "research support, non u.s. gov't",
  "arxiv": null,
  "author_total": 9,
  "authors": [
    {
      "affs": [
        0,
        1
      ],
      "name": "Ruikang Deng"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        2
      ],
      "name": "Huishi Huang"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        2
      ],
      "name": "Shaoli Lv"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        2,
        3
      ],
      "name": "Yu Xing"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        2
      ],
      "name": "Yijie Li"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        2
      ],
      "name": "Cong You"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        0
      ],
      "name": "Fei Wu",
      "orcid": "0000-0003-2139-8807"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        4,
        5
      ],
      "name": "Hongzhu Deng",
      "orcid": "0000-0002-3919-117X"
    },
    {
      "affs": [
        6
      ],
      "name": "Zhengxing Huang",
      "orcid": "0000-0002-2644-8642"
    }
  ],
  "bibtex": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/cc1na23ffp6ae.bib",
  "cited_by": 0,
  "doi": "10.1038/s41467-026-77721-8",
  "fulltext_url": "https://europepmc.org/articles/PMC13677709",
  "id": "cc1na23ffp6ae",
  "issns": [
    "2041-1723"
  ],
  "landing_url": "https://europepmc.org/article/MED/42893978",
  "language": "eng",
  "licence": "CC-BY-NC-ND",
  "licence_label": "CC BY-NC-ND",
  "licence_source": "article",
  "licence_url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/",
  "metadata_licence": null,
  "native_subjects": [
    [
      "openalex",
      "2805|Autism Spectrum Disorder Research"
    ]
  ],
  "openalex": "W7213287626",
  "pdf_url": "https://europepmc.org/articles/PMC13677709?pdf=render",
  "pmcid": "PMC13677709",
  "pmid": "42893978",
  "published": "2026-09-16",
  "publisher": null,
  "ris": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/cc1na23ffp6ae.ris",
  "sources": [
    {
      "first_seen": "2026-10-30T12:19:41Z",
      "native_id": "MED:42893978",
      "source": "europepmc",
      "url": "https://europepmc.org/article/MED/42893978"
    }
  ],
  "subjects": [
    {
      "field": "biology",
      "origin": "openalex:2805|Autism Spectrum Disorder Research",
      "subfield": "neuroscience"
    }
  ],
  "title": "Automated screening of autism via a pretrained vision-language model in naturalistic caregiver-child interactions.",
  "title_text": "Automated screening of autism via a pretrained vision-language model in naturalistic caregiver-child interactions.",
  "type": "peer-reviewed",
  "updated_at": "2026-10-30T12:19:41Z",
  "url": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/cc1na23ffp6ae",
  "venue": "Nature communications",
  "versions": []
}