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Assessment and Understanding of Fear in Children with an ASD
Intense fears and phobias have been reported in up to 64% of children with an ASD (Muris Steerneman, Merckelbach, Holdrinet, & Meesters, 1998). In comparison, only 5% of typically developing children present with intense fears (Ollendick, King, & Muris, 2002). Children with an ASD also have...
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Autism and Asperger’s: Two Distinct Disorders or One Disorder of Varying Symptom Severity
Autism has been conceptualized as a biologically determined set of behaviors occurring with varying presentation and severity that is likely as the result of varying cause (for review, see Goldstein, Naglieri, & Ozonoff, 2008). The disorder occurs significantly more often in boys (Smalley,...
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Boys with Regressive Autism Have Larger Brains than Age-Matched Health Counterparts
In the largest study of brain development in preschoolers with autism to date, a study by UC Davis MIND Institute researchers has found that 3-year-old boys with regressive autism, but not early onset autism, have larger brains than their healthy counterparts. The study is published online today...
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The Lighter Side of the Spectrum: A Mom’s View – Our Story
People often ask me how I knew something was wrong with Jack, and how old he was when we noticed warning signs. Obviously autism unfolds differently for each individual; some demonstrate symptoms very early on, while others grow and interact normally until a particular age and then they seemingly...
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Excessive Folic Acid Supplementation: A Cause for Autism Spectrum Disorders?
Autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) are a group of phenotypically heterogeneous neurodevelopmental disabilities characterized by impairments in three core functional domains: reciprocal social interactions, verbal communication and stereotyped, repetitive patterns of behaviors. The ASDs are...
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Inhibition of Eye Blinking Reveals How Toddlers with ASD Attend Differently to What They Watch
One of the central goals in autism research is to better meet the needs and experiences of individual children on the autism spectrum, even and especially children who may not be able to easily communicate those experiences. Researchers hope that doing so will provide an inroad into helping those...
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Future Directions in Medication Treatments for ASD
There has been enormous growth over the past 10-15 years in research attempting to identify effective medications for children and youth with ASD. A few classes of medications have been shown to be effective for treating specific symptoms associated with autism. There is accumulating data to...
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How Science and Evidence Won Out Against Auditory Integration Therapies
There are many ways of learning about our world. One way is through science and the scientific process. There is a growing belief that the methods of science and scientific inquiry are the standards that should be employed when designing and evaluating autism treatments. Ideally, by adhering to...
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Learning Style Preferences of Students with Autism and How They Align or Differ from Their Typical Peers
Developing successful educational opportunities for students with autism has long been a challenge for educators. This challenge may well be due to the fact that students with autism have unusual intellectual and academic skills profiles making it difficult for teachers to accurately assess...
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New Trends in Brain and Tissue Banking for Autism Research
Professor Giovanni Morgagni, of the University of Padua published in 1761 a book, “The Seats and Causes of Disease Investigated by Anatomy,” that described nearly 700 autopsies and demonstrated that disease is recorded in the pathology of organs in detectable ways. Dr. Richard Cabot’s review...
