Schoolteachers in Oman have a poor understanding of autism’s causes and symptoms, suggests a survey published 22 October in Autism.

The American definition of autism travels well in the U.K. and Finland, but cultural differences in Finland affect how mild symptoms of the disorder are interpreted, according to a new study published 10 October in the journal Autism.

Low levels of a thyroid hormone during pregnancy raise the risk of autism-like symptoms in the child by fourfold, according to a study published 13 August in Annals of Neurology.

Researchers weigh in on the mounting evidence for a paternal-age effect in autism and what it might reveal about evolutionary mechanisms underlying the disorder.

An enzyme that may keep RNA tangle-free as it’s translated into protein is missing in some people with schizophrenia and learning difficulties. The enzyme also cooperates with the protein missing in fragile X syndrome to bind RNA, suggesting a role in protein synthesis. That’s the upshot from two studies published in the September Nature Neuroscience.

Certain mutations may hijack the normal mechanisms of sperm production, leading to an enrichment of mutant sperm in older fathers, and to the paternal-age effect in autism.

Children who have older siblings with autism are seven times more likely than those in the general population to receive autism diagnoses themselves, according to a large Danish study published 19 August in JAMA Pediatrics.

Duplications and deletions of large chromosomal regions are associated with intellectual disability, cognitive deficits and a low likelihood of having children, according to a population-wide study in Iceland. The results were presented Monday at a conference in Cambridge, Massachusetts. 

Girls with autism tend to have smaller heads and bodies than their typically developing peers, whereas boys with the disorder tend to have average-sized heads and slightly larger bodies, report two studies published in July.

About one in ten women who have a child with autism have immune molecules in their bloodstream that react with proteins in the brain, according to a study published 20 August in Molecular Psychiatry.