Autism is most known
as a developmental disorder with difficulties in social interaction and
communication. So, individuals who have this diagnose usually have trouble
interacting with other people whether being a familiar face or just a new
person in its life, also feelings and emotions are not so easily showed to
others in a way that other people do.
Parents and people
who interact daily with a child that has this condition usually notice signs in
the first two or three years of life, since they often have a restricted and
repetitive behavior such as : clapping their hands, head rolling fisting their hands, but also having the
tendency to have everything organized and lined up such as repetitively lining
papers or pens (not to be confused with OCD). Later on their lives, other
repetitive behaviors start to show like frequent hand washing, putting an
object always in the same place and getting irritated if someone moves its
place and also self-injury behaviors such as skin-picking and also head-banging
Besides this,
children with this disorder tend to have develop at a slower pace than normal
ones, although some reach their developmental milestones at a normal pace and
then worsen by slowing down or even backtrack (about a third to a half of
individuals with autism do not develop enough natural speech to correspond the
communication need of the quotidian). Because of that, only a few individuals
with autism are independent when they have reached adulthood but this “rule” is
not mandatory since there are various degrees of autism starting from the softer
almost unnoticeable to the most severe and dependable. Although they have
difficulties in learning the general things, some of them take a particular
interest in specific things such as a television show, meteorology and subjects
involving math, becoming almost an obsession.
It was estimated to affect 24.8 million people in 2015, and is four to
five times more likely to occur in boys than in girls.
Autism is caused not
only by genetic but also environmental factors such as certain infections
during pregnancy (rubella, valproic acid), alcohol and drugs.
This condition
affects information processing in the brain by changing how nerve cells and
their synapses connect and organize.
FUN FACTS:
- Since
people who have autism use more their logical side than the creative one, they
tend to have difficulties with imaginative play;
- They
tend to avoid eye contact and touching;
- They
prefer to have a well stablished everyday routine with every hour corresponding
to the same activity every day;
- Some
symptoms often related to this condition is savant syndrome, which is the
capacity to memorize things in a larger scale than the common people would.
Also, many individuals with ASD (autistic spectrum disorder) show superior
skills in attention and perception comparing to population that doesn’t have
this condition. Besides thing, sensory abnormalities are found in over 90% of
those with autism;
- Most of
the individuals who have this disorder are usually distressed with loud noises;
- When
speaking, they tend to have a flat and monotonous voice;
- They don't understand sarcasm like most people do.
Although this
disorder can not be cured, its symptoms can be improved by treatments like early
speech and behavioral interventions.
Note: A lot of these behaviors that I described in this text are observed in the serie The good doctor.
References
-En.wikipedia.org.
(2018). Autism.
[online] Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autism [Accessed 4 Jan.
2018].
-Medical News Today. (2018). What
Is Autism?. [online] Available at: https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/info/autism [Accessed 4 Jan. 2018].
-Autism.org.uk. (2018). Autism - NAS.
[online] Available at: http://www.autism.org.uk/about/what-
is/asd.aspx [Accessed 4 Jan. 2018].
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