Understanding The Characteristics And Symptoms Of Autism

                

 

The research collected by professional health organizations indicate that autism, or autistic spectrum disorder (ASD) affects approximately 1 out of every 166 children in America. Those numbers would then further indicate that an amazing 1.5 million American children have autism to a certain degree. It is noteworthy that many of these cases of autism have not been diagnosed. The annual growth rate of autism is greater than 14%, meaning it has become a major developmental disability for today?s children.

The occurance of autism is not limited to children, nor does it seem to afflict any particular person based on race or social structure/class. Autism also does not appear to be a result of any injury or accident that may have involved trauma. One thing that is known, however, is that boys are about 4 times more likely to have autism than girls.

So that you can understand how to work with a patient afflicted with autism, it is necessary to understand some background about what autism is and what signs an afflicted person shows. In a core sense, autism is just one of several things known as a cognitive disability or cognitive disorder.

Such a disorder has a negative impact on the child?s ability to learn and develop normally, particularly from the aspect of social interaction. Typically, autism can be diagnosed as early as age 3 in most children, and impairs how the brain reacts to certain stimuli. In that sense, autism is thought to be a neurological disorder. The most prominent signs of autism are difficulty in both verbal and non-verbal communication skills. Difficult with verbal communication is self-explanatory, but in the non-verbal sense, this deals with the difficulty in having social interactions with other people.

Autistic Spectrum Disorder or ASD is crucial to be diagnosed as early as possible in the child?s life, especially when you consider that there are varying degrees of autism, ranging from very mild to severe. If the presence of autism is diagnosed early, the parents of the child can make arrangements to allow the child to benefit from professionals at school, perhaps even a specialized school, where the teachers have received training in autism and understanding how to teach the autistic child.

There are many thoughts about autism and there are also many myths about it. One of those myths is that children who are autistic are "dumb" or have a low IQ. This is not true at all. In terms of academic intelligence, an autistic child can score at the same level as his classmates. Do you remember the movie titled "Rain Man" with Dustin Hoffman, where he was autistic? Although Dustin Hoffman did an excellent job in showing the lack of social interaction and many of the other signs of an autism patient, he was also absolutely brilliant with numbers and in the casino.

There are several characteristics that autistic people will display that can be a clue to the potential presence of autism. Unfortunately, there are no conclusive laboratory tests that can definitively state whether or not a person has autism, simply because it really is a neurological disorder. Such characteristics include, as discussed above, difficulty in verbal and non-verbal communication, distinct resistance to change in schedule or routine, an abnormally low threshold for pain, difficulty or discomfort in making eye contact, and a tendency to fixate on a particular object for very long periods of time.

It is critical to get a child suspected of being autistic diagnosed as early as possible so that an effective course of treatment can be started.

Jon is a computer engineer that maintains many web sites based on his knowledge and experience in various areas. For more information about Autism and Autistic Spectrum Disorder, please visit his web site at Autism Explained.