Editorial: Weighing Benefits and Risks While Treating Irritability and Emotional Dysregulation in Autism

Abstract

Irritability and emotional dysregulation are challenging symptoms to treat in individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASD). Thankfully, there are several multimodal treatment approaches for which there is some empirical evidence, with the number of emerging pharmacological options growing every day. Although much progress has been made in the overall treatment of ASD, the field has eluded innovating on treatments that definitively improve irritability and emotional dysregulation without also causing untoward side effects. Sampling biases, underpowered studies, and measurement problems are challenges that are also opportunities to iterate toward better and more personalized treatments. This editorial reviews the metanalytic syntheses of extant pharmacological options to target irritability and emotional dysregulation in ASD, providing some perspectives about the impact of the current limits of our knowledge, and attempts to conclude hopefully with a horizon of many promising directions for future research.