# Transdiagnostic Associations Across Developmental Disorders

> **NIH NIH R01** · UNIVERSITY OF HOUSTON · 2024 · $671,457

## Abstract

SUMMARY
The Global Burden of Disease (GBD) data of 2017 revealed that worldwide 291.2 million (11.2%) of 2.6 billion
children and adolescents were estimated to have one of four developmental disabilities (childhood epilepsy,
intellectual disability, and vision loss and hearing loss), which is an increase of more than double since 2004.
Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), along with South Asia, hosts the overwhelming majority (94.5%) of these children.
These children, especially in SSA, are severely underrepresented in the relevant literature. The proposed work
is intended to contribute to improving the representation of children and youth from SSA in the scientific
literature. The overarching objective of this work is to identify and characterize children/youth (aged 3-18)
with developmental disabilities (DD) growing up in rural Zambia. The proposed work is structured around three
unique SA. SA1 pertains to the ascertainment of a large sample of children/youth with DD and their matched
siblings (total n = 4,000). SA2 addresses the characterization of this sample of children to identify and classify
the etiology and potential treatment of their DD. SA3 intends to document the services that are currently
accessed by children/youth with DD, and to ascertain community perceptions of DD, to advise on what
services are available, accessed, or needed. Collectively, SA1-3 will generate a unique multi-level (social
context—behavior—brain—genome) dataset presenting a range of manifestations and causal pathways to DD
in rural Zambia in particular and in SSA in general.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10887596
- **Project number:** 5R01HD109307-03
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF HOUSTON
- **Principal Investigator:** ELENA L GRIGORENKO
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2024
- **Award amount:** $671,457
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2022-09-09 → 2027-07-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10887596

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10887596, Transdiagnostic Associations Across Developmental Disorders (5R01HD109307-03). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-24 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10887596. Licensed CC0.

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