Is Autism a medical issue?

jsmoke

jsmoke

jsmoke

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Or could there be an arguement for it being the result of social conditioning. I have had quite a bit of dealing with autistic people, it is usually very tunnel vision outlooks and if they have a sword to bear then can be pretty tricky going. But I still wonder if generations of specfic treatment can lead certain areas of the mind shutting down and hence the person not functioning to some kind of default level.

So what do you think, I think I can accept truely that characters like 'Rainman' are a result of a medical condition, but I find the autistic spectrum such a curious thing between personal treatment v. medical abnormalities.
 
Social conditioning? As in as a result of upbringing and surroundings?

How does that work if a child can be diagnosed to have autism, and by definition, a child isn't old enough to be conditioned "into" autism.
 
Funnily enough i was thinking about autism this morning. Why does it seem to be becoming so much more prevalent?
I fully understand what it is and when I consider people I know with it now compared to when I was a child it just seems to have a much higher occurrence rate. I can remember one kid in our school having symptoms that would match it, now in my nephews nursery there are 5 kids out of 25 in his class diagnosed with it! Speaking to friends and relatives who are teachers they also agree that the symptoms (note that I'm not saying diagnosis) seem far more common now too.
 
jsmoke said:
Or could there be an arguement for it being the result of social conditioning.
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Which argument?
Just that you have thought of it, or have you any evidence at all to back up what you are stating?
Can you link anything?
I'd be quite interested to read it.

I know little of the causes of autism, and have always wondered exactly what they are.
 
Dis86 said:
Funnily enough i was thinking about autism this morning. Why does it seem to be becoming so much more prevalent?
I fully understand what it is and when I consider people I know with it now compared to when I was a child it just seems to have a much higher occurrence rate. I can remember one kid in our school having symptoms that would match it, now in my nephews nursery there are 5 kids out of 25 in his class diagnosed with it! Speaking to friends and relatives who are teachers they also agree that the symptoms (note that I'm not saying diagnosis) seem far more common now too.
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/armchair doctor

Sounds like the criteria for its diagnosis has widened or the accuracy of its diagnosis has improved. It's like there are a lot of kids seemingly with ADHD whereas years ago they were just naughty children who can't keep still.
 
foster grant said:
My Daughter is Autistic, and is very high functioning ..and I have always considered to be a gift she was born with
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it can be, kids with it are normally very good with facts and numbers etc. other times it can be a nightmare with hysterical breakdowns.
 
neil_g said:
it can be, kids with it are normally very good with facts and numbers etc. other times it can be a nightmare with hysterical breakdowns.
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Yeah, and thankfuly she doesnt have outbursts ...she will close in on herself and shut off from things around her, we have to try and get her a new coat this week and that could take up to four hours of in and out of the same shop.
 
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Raymond Lin said:
/armchair doctor

Sounds like the criteria for its diagnosis has widened or the accuracy of its diagnosis has improved. It's like there are a lot of kids seemingly with ADHD whereas years ago they were just naughty children who can't keep still.
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I might not have been clear - i meant symptomatically as I can fully believe some conditions might have just been written off as 'naughty boy' or 'little ****' rather than being accurately diagnosed.
 
It's a developmental disorder. The spectrum comes from the sheer amount of mutations that may lead to similar phenotype of different severity which we group together. It's definitely nothing to do with the environment that an individual was raised in. My source being I done my PhD in life sciences.
 
Muz333 said:
It's a developmental disorder. The spectrum comes from the sheer amount of mutations that may lead to similar phenotype of different severity which we group together. It's definitely nothing to do with the environment that an individual was raised in. My source being I done my PhD in life sciences.
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Specific alleles with multiple mutations, or a host of 'normal' genes in funny patterns out of interest?

-edit, is there any sex linkage? do they tend to be dominant alleles, thus we are seeing more of it?
Is it all genetically diagnosable, or are they using alternative testing methodologies?

I know I could look all this up, but sometimes it is easier to have someone who knows explain in simple terms.
 
Raymond Lin said:
/armchair doctor

Sounds like the criteria for its diagnosis has widened or the accuracy of its diagnosis has improved. It's like there are a lot of kids seemingly with ADHD whereas years ago they were just naughty children who can't keep still.
Click to expand...

Interestingly there is evidence to suggest diagnosis of children with ADHD by school year is seriously flawed.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-35772654

A possible cause is teachers bluntly comparing very young children with almost 12months age difference.

In my opinion the pressure on primary schools to gain "results" based on standardised testing, simply puts pressure on teachers to start making spurious comparisons on behaviour/capability across their groups with neither the background nor the capacity to do so.
 
The diagnosis/classification of a lot of this stuff is rather dubious - it seems like, in many cases, psychologists/psychiatrists create conditions/'illnesses' based on unwanted behaviour with no tests for the conditions they've decided now exist other than evaluating the patient based on their behaviour.

ADHD appears to be a prime example of this sort of thing with 'ADHD' being diagnosed at a very high rate in the US vs France. While at the extreme end of the spectrum there might well be a lot of benefit in getting a diagnosis and receiving treatment for these conditions at the other end you've got people who are otherwise rather normal.

So you end up with US parents who can't control their little **** getting an ADHD diagnosis from some doctor and now the teachers have to be super careful as it is a medical condition not just a kid that can't behave. Or you get people with 'Asperger's' using it as an excuse/crutch to excuse their behaviour.

In fact just as these conditions can exist simply because some professionals have said they exist they can also cease to exist in the same way. For example Asperger's doesn't exist any more within the US, people who were previously classed as having Apserger's are now simply autistic.
 
I know people who have kids who are on the spectrum and there's absolutely no denying that there is an issue, it's very plain to see.

That said, I think it gets used as an excuse a lot as well, much like ADD.
 
Diddums said:
I know people who have kids who are on the spectrum and there's absolutely no denying that there is an issue, it's very plain to see.

That said, I think it gets used as an excuse a lot as well, much like ADD.
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Do you think if we retro actively applied the current diagnosis methods to adults/teachers etc, quite a number of people who would never have been classed as special needs, would now find themselves with a diagnosis?
 
According to my sons (who is autistic) peadiatrician it is not known what causes autism altho she did say it is thought to be passed down from the father

My sons not extremely high on the spectrum but is overly sensitive to loud noises but is excelling in written and number skills and we are now going through the process in moving him to mainstream school

He does often have outbursts in public due to noise or if in overcrowded situations which is my only concern for going mainstream but his current school feel they are golding him back hence the move
 
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