[PEN-L:31483] RE: Autism on the rise

["Devine, James" <jdevine@xxxxxxx>]

Title: RE: Autism on the rise

joanna bujes  wrote:
> > I would think it would be relatively easy to
> > determine whether you are
> > right. Surely they must keep statistics that
> > would help you correlate
> > age/medical intervention with incidence of
> > learning disorders, autism, etc.
 
Charles J. writes:
> Not as easy as you might think, since concepts of
> what is normal and abnormal vary widely (ditto
> dyslexia, ditto attention deficit disorder, etc).

the concept of hard-core autism (Kanner's autism) is pretty clear as these things go. (Concepts such as Asperger's syndrome and PDD are hard to pin down a lot of the time and often lead to misdiagnosis.)

> Also, I doubt if anyone tracks a very large
> number of infants for very long, but a lot of the
> disorders appear past infancy. And by that time,
> all sorts of 'psychological' and 'developmental'
> theories are used to overinterpret what has been
> manifested (e.g., the theory of unloving parents
> and the like).

luckily Bettelheim's Freudian theory of the Refrigerator Mom as the cause of autism ("the theory of unloving parents" -- with the woman taking the blame, natch) has been discredited by almost all studies. Most current theories blame genetics, prenatal "insults," and the like. Autism is seen as a neurobiological disorder.

> I'll keep my eyes open for such a
> study, though. My brother, who works with a lot
> of kids diagnosed as 'autistic' and 'learning
> disabled', thinks it's striking how many of these
> kids are born to older, middle class parents.

there's a lot of self-selection going on: the middle class parents are most likely to make sure that their kids get a more accurate diagnosis, and are so less likely to find their kids labelled "retarded." It's also possible that your brother works in an agency that attracts the middle class. Middle class parents are more likely to go to a public mental-health agency rather than "living with" the child's disorder.

> One
> problem in dealing with such parents is that,
> unlike working class parents, they really do
> think they've done something wrong and fret a lot
> about why their family should be stricken (things
> like this aren't supposed to happen to them).

My experience, with parents of Asperger kids, is that almost none blame themselves. Instead, they're looking for solutions (new diets, treatments, schools, etc.) or someone else to blame (such as those who require childhood vaccinations). Of course, those who attend our support group are self-selecting...

> One
> paradox is that it turns the most right-wing of
> them into limited, self-serving socialists once
> they have to deal with the social services maze
> of the US.

we have little choice but to fight the system (the schools, etc.), but without calling for its abolition. One problem is that it's severely underfunded. (The Americans with Disabilities Act talks a nice game, but isn't backed up with the dough.)

Jim