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New research on autism

Wordsmith

Some Interesting research just published by folk at De Montfort University. They compared brains scans of autistic people with non-autistic people and the results suggest that ‘autistic brains may use alternative neural strategies that we’ve only just begun to understand. . . . Autism has traditionally been seen by science as a deficit compared to non-autistic individuals. Our findings suggest it's not necessarily a deficit at all. Instead, they point toward a different form of brain organisation, one that may reflect diverse ways of thinking, rather than dysfunction.’ (DMU News)

Their paper has been published in brain sciences: ‘Wired Differently? Brain Temporal Complexity and Intelligence in Autism Spectrum Disorder’.

  • Thank you for posting. Since learning what autism is and how I am different, I've viewed it as a different way of thinking and feeling. It's society that makes us "disabled" .

  • I can go along with having a differently organised brain, I'll tell my friend that when we're doing cryptic crosswords and I get the right answer without knowing why.

  • Thank you for signposting this recent paper.

    I shall have another more thorough read through the paper (when time permits).  However, my initial concerns include:

    - the sample size was very small:

    "The final dataset comprised 29 participants aged 18 to 32 years, including 14 individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) (mean age, 23.27 ± 2.92 years) and 15 age-matched typical controls (TC) (mean age, 21.86 ± 4.11 years)."

    - I would have been more at ease if the mean age of both cohorts were age 25, or more (when working with people early in their career - there may often be a discernable difference between colleagues aged 21, or 23, or 25, or over 25 - from each of a personal development, professional development and emotional development perspective - a management team would expect to appropriately support individuals across each of those 4 age bands).

    - It was disappointing, in the current era, to note all individuals were male (equity and diverse representation in healthcare is well overdue).

    For a slightly more reader-friendly description of the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale and Autism considerations - I found this article helpful:

    "IQ testing as part of the diagnostic process" (2017)

    British Psychological Society (2017). Psychological assessment of adults with specific performance difficulties at work. Leicester: Author.

    DOI: 10.53841/bpsrep.2017.inf276.5

    The British Psychological Society (BPS).

    This chapter appears in: Psychological assessment of adults with specific performance difficulties at work

    https://explore.bps.org.uk/content/report-guideline/bpsrep.2017.inf276/chapter/bpsrep.2017.inf276.5

  • Wordsmith said:
    Autism has traditionally been seen by science as a deficit compared to non-autistic individuals. Our findings suggest it's not necessarily a deficit at all.

    An interesting take on it.

    I don't think autism itself is a deficit, it is the impact of its traits that causes a deficit for some of us in the world we live in.

    A lot of it is related to sensory inputs - bright lights, loud noises, textures, temperatures etc can all cause sensory overloads leading to anxiety, burnout and/or meltdowns.

    Our challenges in learning social skills (even as adults) result in social exclusion, abuse and alienation in many cases. So many autists report they just can't learn the social skills that it implies a deficit in this area.

    We can have strengths though, but these seem hard to realise and appear to be patchy in their application (special interest focus, pattern recognition etc).

    We seem a long way from being able to realistically view autism as simply being different - the differences come at a significant cost to us and rise to the level of a disability for most.