Opinion / Viewpoint
Listening to parents can curtail autism’s diagnostic odyssey
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Surveys of parents’ impressions of their child’s emotional and behavioral problems can improve autism screening and shorten waitlists for diagnostic evaluations.
TOPIC
Signs & Symptoms
Autism’s core symptoms accompany a constellation of subtle signs that scientists are just beginning to unmask.
News
Increasing delays in development may signal autism in preterm babies
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Extremely preterm babies later diagnosed with autism tend to show steep declines in development, a pattern that could flag them for intervention as early as 6 months of age.
Opinion / Viewpoint
The perils of suggesting famous historical figures had autism
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Looking for signs of autism in characters from history and literature can offer insight into society’s changing perceptions through time — but it can also increase the risk of stigma against people with the condition.
Features / Deep Dive
Eyeing the connection between autism and vision
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Autism is unusually common among blind people, and children with autism are more likely to have vision problems than their typical peers. Understanding why could lead to better therapies for autism for autism.
September 2020
Opinion / Viewpoint
We need better strategies to support autistic people as the COVID-19 crisis continues
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Interviews with autistic people reveal that many miss their friends and opportunities for social connection, in stark contrast to orthodox views that they have little social motivation and prefer a life of self-isolation.
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News
Autism prevalence in the United States explained
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The bulk of the increase in autism prevalence stems from a growing awareness of the condition and changes to the diagnostic criteria.
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August 2020
News
Facial expressions between autistic and typical people may be mismatched
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Conversations between an autistic and a typical person involve less smiling and more mismatched facial expressions than do interactions between two typical people.
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News
Brain’s center of automatic body functions has autism links
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The brainstem controls such disparate functions as breathing, sensation and sleep — all of which can be altered in autism.
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News / Toolbox
New measures of social skills tap what monkeys see, do
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A pair of tools that gauge social abilities in rhesus macaques may help researchers study autism-like behaviors in monkeys.
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News
Motor difficulties in autism, explained
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Most people with autism have motor difficulties, ranging from an atypical gait to problems with handwriting, but researchers still have much to learn about their causes and consequences.
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Features / Deep Dive
Confusion at the crossroads of autism and hearing loss
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Hearing difficulties and autism often overlap, exacerbating autism traits and complicating diagnoses.
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Opinion
Autism and eating disorders may have an emotional connection
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Eating disorders have the highest mortality rates of any kinds of mental illness. They don’t discriminate, affecting people of all ethnicities, sexualities, gender identities, ages and backgrounds.
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News
Studies unravel diversity of traits tied to chromosome 16 mutations
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Two new analyses help to explain why mutations to the chromosomal region 16p11.2 can lead to autism, intellectual disability or language difficulties.