ENGLISH LANGUAGE
AUTISM
A developmental disability caused by
differences in the brain
Prepared by: Nazik Jamal Abdullah
Supervised by: Mr. Hekar
12th grade class (B)
Qasrok high school for the girls
Table of contents
1. AUTISM
2. CHARACTERISTICS
3. SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT
4. COMMUNICATION
5. REPETITIVE BEHAVIOR
6. OTHER SYMPTOMS
7. CAUSES
8. HISTORY
9. REFERENCES
1. Autism
Autism is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by difficulties with social interaction
and communication, and by restricted and repetitive behavior.Parents often notice signs
during the first three years of their child's life. These signs often develop gradually, though
some autistic children experience regression in their communication and social skills after
reaching developmental milestones at a normal pace.
Autism is associated with a combination of genetic and environmental factors.Risk factors
during pregnancy include certain infections, such as rubella, toxins including valproic acid,
alcohol, cocaine, pesticides, lead, and air pollution, fetal growth restriction, and autoimmune
diseases. Controversies surround other proposed environmental causes; for example, the
vaccine hypothesis, which has been disproven. Autism affects information processing in the
brain and how nerve cells and their synapses connect and organize; how this occurs is not
well understood.The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5)
combines forms of the condition, including Asperger syndrome and pervasive
developmental disorder not otherwise specified (PDD-NOS) into the diagnosis of autism
spectrum disorder (ASD).Several interventions have been shown to reduce symptoms and
improve the ability of autistic people to function and participate independently in the
community. Behavioral, psychological, education, and/or skill-building interventions may
be used to assist autistic people to learn life skills necessary for living independently, as well
as other social, communication, and language skills. Therapy also aims to reduce
challenging behaviors and build upon strengths.Some autistic adults are unable to live
independently. An autistic culture has developed, with some individuals seeking a cure and
others believing autism should be accepted as a difference to be accommodated instead of
cured.
Globally, autism is estimated to affect 24.8 million people as of 2015. In the 2000s, the
number of autistic people worldwide was estimated at 1–2 per 1,000 people. In the
developed countries, about 1.5% of children are diagnosed with ASD as of 2017, from 0.7%
in 2000 in the United States. It is diagnosed four to five times more often in males than
females.The number of people diagnosed has increased considerably since the 1990s, which
may be partly due to increased recognition of the condition
2. CHARACTERISTICS
Autism is a highly variable neurodevelopmental disorder [ whose symptoms first appear
during infancy or childhood, and generally follows a steady course without remission.
Autistic people may be severely impaired in some respects but average, or even superior, in
others. Overt symptoms gradually begin after the age of six months, become established by
age two or three years and tend to continue through adulthood, although often in more muted
form. It is distinguished by a characteristic triad of symptoms: impairments in social
interaction, impairments in communication, and repetitive behavior. Other aspects, such as
atypical eating, are also common but are not essential for diagnosis. Individual symptoms
of autism occur in the general population and appear not to associate highly, without a sharp
line separating pathologically severe from common traits
3. SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT
Social deficits distinguish autism and the related autism spectrum disorders (ASD; see
Classification) from other developmental disorders. Autistic people have social impairments
and often lack the intuition about others that many people take for granted. Noted autistic
Temple Grandin described her inability to understand the social communication of
neurotypicals, or people with typical neural development, as leaving her feeling "like an
anthropologist on Mars".
Unusual social development becomes apparent early in childhood. Autistic infants show less
attention to social stimuli, smile and look at others less often, and respond less to their own
name. Autistic toddlers differ more strikingly from social norms; for example, they have
less eye contact and turn-taking, and do not have the ability to use simple movements to
express themselves, such as pointing at things. Three- to five-year-old autistic children are
less likely to exhibit social understanding, approach others spontaneously, imitate and
respond to emotions, communicate nonverbally, and take turns with others. However, they
do form attachments to their primary caregivers. Most autistic children display moderately
less attachment security than neurotypical children, although this difference disappears in
children with higher mental development or less pronounced autistic traits. Older children
and adults with ASD perform worse on tests of face and emotion recognition although this
may be partly due to a lower ability to define a person's own emotions.
Children with high-functioning autism have more intense and frequent loneliness compared
to non-autistic peers, despite the common belief that autistic children prefer to be alone.
Making and maintaining friendships often proves to be difficult for autistic people. For
them, the quality of friendships, not the number of friends, predicts how lonely they feel.
Functional friendships, such as those resulting in invitations to parties, may affect the quality
of life more deeply.
There are many anecdotal reports, but few systematic studies, of aggression and violence in
individuals with ASD. The limited data suggest that, in children with intellectual disability,
autism is associated with aggression, destruction of property, and meltdowns.
(such as rubber, wood, and cloth), and controlled fluorination of organic compounds by the
action of elemental fluorine is only possible if special precautions are taken.
4. COMMUNICATION
About one third to half of autistic people do not develop enough natural speech to meet their
daily communication needs. Differences in communication may be present from the first
year of life, and may include delayed onset of babbling, unusual gestures, diminished
responsiveness, and vocal patterns that are not synchronized with the caregiver. In the
second and third years, autistic children have less frequent and less diverse babbling,
consonants, words, and word combinations; their gestures are less often integrated with
words. Autistic children are less likely to make requests or share experiences, and are more
likely to simply repeat others' words (echolalia) or reverse pronouns. Joint attention seems
to be necessary for functional speech, and deficits in joint attention seem to distinguish
infants with ASD. For example, they may look at a pointing hand instead of the object to
which the hand is pointing, and they consistently fail to point at objects in order to comment
on or share an experience.Autistic children may have difficulty with imaginative play and
with developing symbols into language.
In a pair of studies, high-functioning autistic children aged 8–15 performed equally well as,
and as adults better than, individually matched controls at basic language tasks involving
vocabulary and spelling. Both autistic groups performed worse than controls at complex
language tasks such as figurative language, comprehension, and inference. As people are
often sized up initially from their basic language skills, these studies suggest that people
speaking to autistic individuals are more likely to overestimate what their audience
comprehends
5. REPETITIVE BEHAVIOR
• Autistic individuals can display many forms of repetitive or restricted behavior, which
the Repetitive Behavior Scale-Revised (RBS-R) categorizes as follows.
• Stereotyped behaviors: Repetitive movements, such as hand flapping, head rolling, or
body rocking.
• Compulsive behaviors: Time-consuming behaviors intended to reduce the anxiety
that an individual feels compelled to perform repeatedly or according to rigid rules,
such as placing objects in a specific order, checking things, or handwashing.
• Sameness: Resistance to change; for example, insisting that the furniture not be
moved or refusing to be interrupted.
• Ritualistic behavior: Unvarying pattern of daily activities, such as an unchanging
menu or a dressing ritual. This is closely associated with sameness and an independent
validation has suggested combining the two factors.
• Restricted interests: Interests or fixations that are abnormal in theme or intensity of
focus, such as preoccupation with a single television program, toy, or game.
Self-injury: Behaviors such as eye-poking, skin-picking, hand-biting and head-banging.
No single repetitive or self-injurious behavior seems to be specific to autism, but autism
appears to have an elevated pattern of occurrence and severity of these behaviors.
• Autistic individuals can display many forms of repetitive or restricted behavior, which
the Repetitive Behavior Scale-Revised (RBS-R) categorizes as follows.
• Stereotyped behaviors: Repetitive movements, such as hand flapping, head rolling, or
body rocking.
• Compulsive behaviors: Time-consuming behaviors intended to reduce the anxiety
that an individual feels compelled to perform repeatedly or according to rigid rules,
such as placing objects in a specific order, checking things, or handwashing.
• Sameness: Resistance to change; for example, insisting that the furniture not be
moved or refusing to be interrupted.
• Ritualistic behavior: Unvarying pattern of daily activities, such as an unchanging
menu or a dressing ritual. This is closely associated with sameness and an independent
validation has suggested combining the two factors.
• Restricted interests: Interests or fixations that are abnormal in theme or intensity of
focus, such as preoccupation with a single television program, toy, or game.
Self-injury: Behaviors such as eye-poking, skin-picking, hand-biting and head-banging.
No single repetitive or self-injurious behavior seems to be specific to autism, but autism
appears to have an elevated pattern of occurrence and severity of these behaviors.
Rocket fuels
• Polymer and plastics production
• Teflon and tefzel production
• When combined with oxygen, used as a refrigerator cooler
• Hydrofluoric acid used for glass etching
• Purify public water supplies
• Uranium production
• Air conditioning
6. OTHER SYMPTOMS
Autistic individuals may have symptoms that are independent of the diagnosis, but that can
affect the individual or the family.An estimated 0.5% to 10% of individuals with ASD show
unusual abilities, ranging from splinter skills such as the memorization of trivia to the
extraordinarily rare talents of prodigious autistic savants.Many individuals with ASD show
superior skills in perception and attention, relative to the general population.Sensory
abnormalities are found in over 90% of autistic people, and are considered core features by
some,although there is no good evidence that sensory symptoms differentiate autism from
other developmental disorders. Differences are greater for under-responsivity (for example,
walking into things) than for over-responsivity (for example, distress from loud noises) or
for sensation seeking (for example, rhythmic movements). An estimated 60–80% of autistic
people have motor signs that include poor muscle tone, poor motor planning, and toe
walking; deficits in motor coordination are pervasive across ASD and are greater in autism
proper. Unusual eating behavior occurs in about three-quarters of children with ASD, to the
extent that it was formerly a diagnostic indicator. Selectivity is the most common problem,
although eating rituals and food refusal also occur.
There is tentative evidence that gender dysphoria occurs more frequently in autistic people
(see Autism and LGBT identities). As well as that, a 2021 anonymized online survey of 16–
90-year-olds revealed that autistic males are more likely to be bisexual, while autistic
females are more likely to be homosexual.
Gastrointestinal problems are one of the most commonly co-occurring medical conditions
in autistic people. These are linked to greater social impairment, irritability, behavior and
sleep problems, language impairments and mood changes.
Parents of children with ASD have higher levels of stress. Siblings of children with ASD
report greater admiration of and less conflict with the affected sibling than siblings of
unaffected children and were similar to siblings of children with Down syndrome in these
aspects of the sibling relationship. However, they reported lower levels of closeness and
intimacy than siblings of children with Down syndrome; siblings of individuals with ASD
have greater risk of negative well-being and poorer sibling relationships as adults
7. CAUSES
Autism has a strong genetic basis, although the genetics of autism are complex and it is
unclear whether ASD is explained more by rare mutations with major effects, or by rare
multigene interactions of common genetic variants. Complexity arises due to interactions
among multiple genes, the environment, and epigenetic factors which do not change DNA
sequencing but are heritable and influence gene expression. Many genes have been
associated with autism through sequencing the genomes of affected individuals and their
parents.Studies of twins suggest that heritability is 0.7 for autism and as high as 0.9 for ASD,
and siblings of those with autism are about 25 times more likely to be autistic than the
general population. However, most of the mutations that increase autism risk have not been
identified. Typically, autism cannot be traced to a Mendelian (single-gene) mutation or to a
single chromosome abnormality, and none of the genetic syndromes associated with ASDs
have been shown to selectively cause ASD. Numerous candidate genes have been located,
with only small effects attributable to any particular gene.Most loci individually explain less
than 1% of cases of autism.The large number of autistic individuals with unaffected family
members may result from spontaneous structural variation—such as deletions, duplications
or inversions in genetic material during meiosis. Hence, a substantial fraction of autism
cases may be traceable to genetic causes that are highly heritable but not inherited: that is,
the mutation that causes the autism is not present in the parental genome. Autism may be
underdiagnosed in women and girls due to an assumption that it is primarily a male
condition, but genetic phenomena such as imprinting and X linkage have the ability to raise
the frequency and severity of conditions in males, and theories have been put forward for a
genetic reason why males are diagnosed more often, such as the imprinted brain hypothesis
and the extreme male brain theory.
Maternal nutrition and inflammation during preconception and pregnancy influences fetal
neurodevelopment. Intrauterine growth restriction is associated with ASD, in both term and
preterm infants.Maternal inflammatory and autoimmune diseases may damage fetal tissues,
aggravating a genetic problem or damaging the nervous system.
Exposure to air pollution during pregnancy, especially heavy metals and particulates, may
increase the risk of autism. Environmental factors that have been claimed without evidence
to contribute to or exacerbate autism include certain foods, infectious diseases, solvents,
PCBs, phthalates and phenols used in plastic products, pesticides, brominated flame
retardants, alcohol, smoking, illicit drugs, vaccines, and prenatal stress. Some, such as the
MMR vaccine, have been completely disproven.
Parents may first become aware of autistic symptoms in their child around the time of a
routine vaccination. This has led to unsupported theories blaming vaccine "overload", a
vaccine preservative, or the MMR vaccine for causing autism.The latter theory was
supported by a litigation-funded study that has since been shown to have been "an elaborate
fraud". Although these theories lack convincing scientific evidence and are biologically
implausible, parental concern about a potential vaccine link with autism has led to lower
rates of childhood immunizations, outbreaks of previously controlled childhood diseases in
some countries, and the preventable deaths of several children
8. HISTORY
A few examples of autistic symptoms and treatments were described long before autism was
named. The Table Talk of Martin Luther, compiled by his notetaker, Mathesius, contains
the story of a 12-year-old boy who may have been severely autistic.The earliest well-
documented case of autism is that of Hugh Blair of Borgue, as detailed in a 1747 court case
in which his brother successfully petitioned to annul Blair's marriage to gain Blair's
inheritance. The Wild Boy of Aveyron, a feral child caught in 1798, showed several signs
of autism; the medical student Jean Itard treated him with a behavioral program designed to
help him form social attachments and to induce speech via imitation.
The New Latin word autismus (English translation autism) was coined by the Swiss
psychiatrist Eugen Bleuler in 1910 as he was defining symptoms of schizophrenia. He
derived it from the Greek word autós (αὐτός, meaning "self"), and used it to mean morbid
self-admiration, referring to "autistic withdrawal of the patient to his fantasies, against which
any influence from outside becomes an intolerable disturbance". A Soviet child psychiatrist,
Grunya Sukhareva, described a similar syndrome that was published in Russian in 1925,
and in German in 1926
9. REFERENCES
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2. "NIMH " Autism Spectrum Disorder". nimh.nih.gov. October 2016. Retrieved 20
April 2017.
3. Autism Spectrum Disorder, 299.00 (F84.0). In: American Psychiatric Association.
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition. American
Psychiatric Publishing; 2013.
4. Chaste P, Leboyer M (2012). "Autism risk factors: genes, environment, and gene-
environment interactions". Dialogues in Clinical Neuroscience. 14 (3): 281–292.
doi:10.31887/DCNS.2012.14.3/pchaste. PMC 3513682. PMID 23226953.
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Work Practice. Oxford University Press, New York. p. 72. ISBN 978-0-19-516830-
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