-
The Failure to Accurately Diagnose Girls with Asperger’s Syndrome
The work of Dr. William Mandy has explored the traditionally accepted gender ratio regarding the prevalence of Asperger’s Syndrome in and girls; most studies cite a higher ratio of boys as having Asperger’s Syndrome (AS). The research of Dr. Mandy and his associates show that girls with...
-
Perspective and Advice from a Young Woman in College with ASD
Why is it sometimes difficult to identify females with autism spectrum disorder (ASD)? Have they taught themselves to behave differently in social situations? Have they mastered the act of a social fake? Or have they simply figured out how to seek refuge and escape? In working with students with...
-
How Autism Manifests Differently in Girls: What Families Need to Know
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), in 2010 The Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring (ADDM) Network released data that showed “ASD prevalence…was 4–5 times higher among boys than girls” (http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/ss6302a1.htm)....
-
The Self in Girls and Women with Autism Spectrum Disorder
“Know thyself” - Socrates A central focus in autism spectrum disorder (ASD) research and clinical practice are core challenges in social reciprocity and social interaction - the interpersonal. The self in ASD - the intrapersonal - has been paid relatively little attention. This article...
-
What Happened to All the Females with Autism Spectrum Disorders?
The concept of an autistic disorder is generally accepted to have originated with Leo Kanner and his classic 1943 account of ‘Autistic Disorders of Affective Contact’ (Kanner, 1943). He described 11 children with what would now be regarded as severe autism. Three of these 11 were girls, and as...
-
“Labels Do Not Describe Me” Gender Identity Among Women on the Autism Spectrum
A large number of women with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) are currently undiagnosed or misdiagnosed. In the United States, for every four males diagnosed with ASD, only one female is diagnosed (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2012). While there is likely to be a true sex difference in...
-
Sex Differences in Autism: A Treatment Perspective
Sex differences in prevalence have been reported in several mental disorders. For example, the prevalence of trichotillomania, anorexia nervosa, and bulimia nervosa are reported to be as much as 10 times more common in girls than boys (American Psychiatric Association, 2013). By contrast, autism...
-
“Give a Spit” to Help Scientists Uncover the “Female Protective Effect” for Autism
For years, we’ve known that four times as many boys as girls are diagnosed with autism. More recently, genetic research has surprisingly shown that the various genes that cause autism are equally distributed in boys and girls. So what explains this difference - why do some girls who have the...
-
The Unique Needs of Women and Girls with Autism
My own experience perhaps gives an insight into the repeatedly similar tales I hear from other autistic women and parents of girls. I came to the field of autism via employment in education and then as Training Manager of a specialist Asperger mentoring project for young people. By this point,...
-
The Social Needs of Women on the Autism Spectrum
Current research on adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) without intellectual disability suggests that outcomes for adult women with ASD are especially poor relative to those of men (Taylor, Henninger, & Mailick, 2015). These findings stand in sharp contrast to recent findings that women...
