In studies of autism, the term ‘high-functioning’ is often used to describe a person with autism who scores above 70 or 80 on intelligence quotient (IQ) tests. Scientists sometimes exclude those who score below this cutoff from their autism research because the participants may have difficulty following instructions or completing the study.
But relying on IQ is a crude approach, says Peter Szatmari, the chief of the Child and Youth Mental Health Collaborative at the Center for Addiction and Mental Health and the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, who leads the long-term Canadian study. “It’s not a measure of functioning; it’s a measure of whether or not they’ve got intellectual disability,” he says. “It doesn’t reflect how kids with autism do in the real world.”
.. But the label can trap children in a category that is often stigmatizing. “The term ‘low-functioning’ is just awful,” Lord says.
.. “Someone could be very bright on an IQ test but be very socially impaired and have enormous problems in forming relationships or managing within the environment because of sensory sensitivities or high levels of anxiety.”
.. Still, Alex’s parents worry that her ‘low-functioning’ label might be hindering her development. Alex enjoys swimming, for example, but her parents say they have seen advertisements for swim lessons that can accommodate only high-functioning children with autism.
What Prodigies Could Teach Us About Autism
Prodigies, like many autistic people, have a nearly insatiable passion for their area of interest. Lauren Voiers, an art prodigy from the Cleveland area, painted well into the night as a teenager; sometimes she didn’t sleep at all before school began. That sounds a lot like the “highly restricted, fixated interests” that are part of autism’s diagnostic criteria.
.. Prodigies also have exceptional working memories.
.. Extreme memory has long been linked to autism as well.
.. Simon Baron-Cohen, an autism researcher, and his colleagues have described an excellent eye for detail as “a universal feature of the autistic brain.”
.. Beyond the cognitive similarities, many child prodigies have autistic relatives. In the 2012 study, half of the prodigies had an autistic relative at least as close as a niece or grandparent. Three
.. Perhaps prodigies have a very specific and unusual form of autism: They have many of the strengths associated with the condition, but few of the difficulties. This makes prodigies potentially important not just for talent research but also for autism research.
.. Rather, the prodigies may be people who were at risk of having this condition, yet don’t.
Institute for the Study of the Neurologically Typical
Neurotypical syndrome is a neurobiological disorder characterized by preoccupation with social concerns, delusions of superiority, and obsession with conformity.
Neurotypical individuals often assume that their experience of the world is either the only one, or the only correct one. NTs find it difficult to be alone. NTs are often intolerant of seemingly minor differences in others. When in groups NTs are socially and behaviorally rigid, and frequently insist upon the performance of dysfunctional, destructive, and even impossible rituals as a way of maintaining group identity. NTs find it difficult to communicate directly, and have a much higher incidence of lying as compared to persons on the autistic spectrum.
5 Books: Steve Silgerman on Autism
“We already understand the value of biodiversity in a rainforest. The same is true of any community of human minds.”
.. Asperger believed that autism is a condition that requires life-long support from parents and teachers, and that autism and autistic traits are common and always have been. He also recognised that autism can convey some special cognitive gifts even in the presence of profound disability. He noted the prevalence of autistic traits among prominent scientists and believed that those traits helped them do their work. He observed: “It seems that for success in science and art, a dash of autism is essential. The necessary ingredient may be an ability to turn away from the everyday world, from the simply practical, an ability to rethink a subject with originality so as to create in new untrodden ways.”
.. I’ll try to give you a very condensed version, though important layers of nuance will inevitably be lost. Asperger believed that autism is a condition that requires life-long support from parents and teachers, and that autism and autistic traits are common and always have been. He also recognised that autism can convey some special cognitive gifts even in the presence of profound disability. He noted the prevalence of autistic traits among prominent scientists and believed that those traits helped them do their work. He observed: “It seems that for success in science and art, a dash of autism is essential. The necessary ingredient may be an ability to turn away from the everyday world, from the simply practical, an ability to rethink a subject with originality so as to create in new untrodden ways.”
.. Kanner took a much narrower and darker view of the condition he claimed to discover. He framed autism as a rare form of childhood psychosis – likely a precursor to adult schizophrenia – triggered by emotionally cold, hyper-ambitious “refrigerator” parents.
.. the word “neurodiversity” was coined in the 1990s by an Australian sociology grad student named Judy Singer after reading a book about the social model of disability, which proposes that disability is a product of the way society is organised, rather than by limitations imposed by a person’s condition.
.. deeply honest book by a woman who didn’t know she was autistic until she was in her 40s because the Asperger’s syndrome diagnosis didn’t exist yet. Instead of presenting this moment as a tragedy, Kim makes clear how empowering a mid-life diagnosis can be: “Once it became clear that I was on the autism spectrum, my first reaction was relief,” she writes. “It explained so much that I thought was my fault – for not trying hard enough or being good enough.”
.. The pitch-perfect FAQ explained, “Neurotypical syndrome is a neurobiological disorder characterized by preoccupation with social concerns, delusions of superiority, and obsession with conformity. There is no known cure.”
.. The Real Experts is a much-needed antidote to the poisonous misconceptions that have caused autistic people and their families untold grief for decades, and offers parents of young people on the spectrum something they never had in the past: role models of successful, empowered, radical autistic lives.
.. One of the Jedi mind-tricks of NeuroTribes is that the autistic person in any scene is almost always the emotional center of the scene, even if clinicians or parents are also in the room: a subversive reversal of the usual framing of autistic lives.
.. Now when a reporter calls to ask me for a comment about autism, I often advise them to talk to autistic adults for the story. Imagine stories about racism that only quoted white people or stories about blindness written entirely from a sighted perspective.