'Passive' Autism

My son has just been diagnosed with passive autism and basically what it means is that they learn by copying, life gets harder as they get older my son is now 15 and has a lot of his coping strategies in place already but has been bullied every day has no friends no sense of direction won't play out he has problems with eating sleeping bathing  and lots of other things he's getting help now but it's been hard with him not being diagnosed earlier 

hi I have 2 young children with ASD and both are polar opposites. I was made aware of people with ASD being passive when I did my local Autism Outreach course. Although I have never heard of it described as 'passive autism' our outreach team gave us copies of 2 'icebergs' 1 aggresive and 1 passive. it was then I realised why they were so different in their behaviours. My daughter is exactly described in the passive section of a previous post she can and often does get very distressed about the smallest of things and will stay that way for sometimes an hour e.g. just today she dropped an icepop on the floor and was upset so her Granny picked it up for her, this made her more distressed and she pointed to the floor crying "oh no" so my mam had to put it down and let me pick it up then she was fine. She is happy to just sit back and take others leads doesnt participate in play with others but happy to be around them, when she is stressed she can go very quiet and withdraw. Our Autism Outreach team told us that it is more worrying because often these childrens anxiety gets missed because they are just quiet and not aggressive/crazy like my son. She is nearly 4.

Hi Oliverlouis,

Thanks for your reply. I know what you mean about being in the minority and there is very little information. My son has just been placed into a communication unit in a mainstream nursery after a lot pushing to get him early intervention. He also attends one to one therapy at a local Autism unit which is fantastic. As said before my son babbles constantly and maybe form a word now and again and I'm told this is quite positive. Does your son have speech and if so when did this happen? I have also heard children labelled with 'Passive' Autism' may not bother with what's going on round about them. But to be honest my boy is very bright (we have been told by the doctors at hospital) he does not have a developmental delay and seems to pick up tasks reasonably quickly. He loves to play rough and tumble with his Dad and comes looking for him to start the game. :-)

Here is the fuller version of Lorna Wing's categories, which was quoted on another forum so I don't have access to the original source (and cannot find it):

Aloof
Most frequent subtype among the lower functioning. Most high-functioning in this group are a mixture of aloof and passive. Limited language use. Copes with life using autistic routines. Most are recognised in childhood. Independence is difficult to achieve. There may be loneliness and sadness beneath the aloofness. Rain Man is an excellent example of this subgroup.        

Passive
Often amiable, gentle, and easily led. Those passive rather than aloof from infancy may fit AS. More likely than the aloof to have had a mainstream education, and their psych skill profiles are less uneven. Social approaches passively accepted (little response or show of feelings). Characteristic autistic egocentricity less obvious in this group than in others. Activities are limited and repetitive, but less so than other autistics. Can react with unexpected anger or distress. Recognition of their autism depends more on observing the absence of the social and creative aspects of normal development than the presence of positive abnormalities. The general amenability is an advantage in work, and they are reliable, but sometimes their passivity and naivete can cause great problems. If undiagnosed, parents and teachers may be disappointed they cannot keep a job at the level predicted from their schoolwork.

Active-but-odd
Can fall in any of the other groups in early childhood. Some show early developmental course of Kanner's, some show AS. Some have the characteristic picture of higher visuospatial abilities, others have better verbal scores (mainly due to wide vocabulary and memory for facts). May be specific learning disorders (e.g., numerical). School placement often difficult. They show social naivete, odd, persistent approaches to others, and are uncooperative in uninteresting tasks. Diagnosis often missed. Tend to look at people too long and hard. Circumscribed interests in subjects are common.

Stilted
Few, if any clues to the underlying subtle handicap upon first meeting. The features of AS are particularly frequent. Early histories vary. Normal range of ability with some peaks of performance. Polite and conventional. Manage well at work. Sometimes pompous and long-winded style of speech. Problems arise in family relationships, where spontaneity and empathy are required. Poor judgement as to the relative importance of different demands on their time. Characteristically pursue interests to the exclusion of everything and everyone else. May have temper tantrums or aggression if routine broken at home, but are polite at work. Diagnosis very often missed. Most attend mainstream schools. Independence achieved in most cases. This group shades into the eccentric end of normality.

Yes, I have always been the more passive type myself, but you can be a mix and I have traits of the other types too.  It can change according to age as well and it isn't as rare as whatever you read implied.

You would think being a professional the speech therapist would feel it a duty to come out with sense.

There's massive disagreement, over a wide range, as to how many children with learning disabilities have autism. And about the same debate about people with autism having a learning disability

NAS website says between 48 and 52% of people with autism have some form of learning disability. But that's from a mean value across a range of studies of between 30% and 85% of people with autism having greater than 70 IQ.

A lot of people with autism have comorbid dyslexia which is a learning difficulty.

In other words its not clear enough to make bald statements. And your speech therapist is possibly not as well informed as he/she pretends

Hi,

My son was disagnosed at 3 & 1/2 as having PDD-NOS (a mid form of autism). He is now 4 & 1/2. He sounds a lot like your son. We have barely any sensory issues and he is very happy to go anywhere and very keen to play with large crouds but also struggles to communicate well or ask to play etc. I asked his speech therapist this week about how hard it is to find information about kids with his form of autism and she said that is because he is in the minority group...being a passive communicator. She also said that 80% of kids diagnosed with autism have an intellectual disability, whereas our son is very bright. It's so frustrating finding information about his form of austism. I hope this helps in some way :-)

Could NAS try to find out what different classifications of autism are being given out, and how many are out of date, based on obsolete thinking?  

GPs often have odd ideas about autism, such as it being something you grow out of, and so do many clinicians, for example those that think that if an adult has no gaze aversion he /she has normal eye contact.

There is a big problem out there with the quality of diagnostic methods.

Hi,

Thanks so much for the information. Yes that certainly sounds like my son, he does respond to interactions but will not initiate play.... except maybe to get his Dad to chase him along the garden :-) 

Hi found this on the net and thought it might help.

Dr Lorna Wing, a very well known researcher, writer and clinician in the field of autism has developed a model to help us understand these complexities. She coined the term 'Autism Spectrum Disorders' to describe a 'triad of impairment', with each component depicted along a continuum. The following diagrams may help to illustrate this concept and further explain the characteristics of Autism Spectrum Disorder, and how they can vary from person to person.

What makes understanding Autism Spectrum Disorder so hard is that an affected person may have characteristics or behaviours from any point on each continuum in the triad.

Impairment of Social RelationshipsAloofPassiveActive but odd

• The aloof type shows almost complete indifference to other people.
• The passive type will respond to interactions but not initiate them.
• The active but odd type will initiate interactions with others but in an odd, repetitive and often inappropriate way.

Hi, Thanks for your comments. Too be honest I don't know much about the terminology but the doctor said he fell into the category 'passive' as he did not seem to bother about his environment and was happy to go anywhere we took him. He does not seem to have many sensory issues. Her description was that he prefers to 'run with the herd' but would not ask them. He is babbling a lot but not forming many words yet. I read somewhere this category of 'passive' is not as common and the children are happy to play alongside but will not interact as much.

Hi - I think I've heard the term before but don't know much about it in any detail.  Others may come along who'll be better informed.  There may be info by doing a search via google etc.  Sorry I can't be of much help.  He sounds like a nice little fella.

passive autism ?