Welcome back to Reading the Research, where I trawl the Internet to find noteworthy research on autism and related subjects, then discuss it in brief with bits from my own life, research, and observations.
Today's article underlines a point I think many parents miss, but is kind of obvious when you think about it.
First: all behavior is communication. When we talk about communication in a mainstream sense, we tend to be referring to a very narrow range of what communication actually is. Mainly, we're talking about speaking the country's dominant language, while following the rules the majority of the population follows. We might also be talking about what I'm doing here: writing and reading in said dominant language.
The thing is, communication is so much more than that. It's what actions a person takes. It's how they take those actions. It's pictures and graphs and tone of voice and other languages and personal slang. There are an absolutely dizzying number of ways people can communicate.
Calling any of that "problem behavior" is kind of ignoring the essential nature of that behavior. If it's a problem for you, then you should figure out what the behavior is communicating.
Non-verbal autistic people sometimes behave aggressively. This can be for a lot of reasons, from frustration with their situation, to despair in their life prospects, to the one this article is tracking: pain.
Anyone who's dealt with sufferers of chronic pain, or even been in a bad mood due to a headache or backache, shouldn't find this surprising. Being in pain, especially day after day, has real consequences for your mood and outlook. You can see this often in older people, whose bodies can cause them significant pain due to any number of ailments. The word I've often heard or such people is "crotchety," but "crabby," "volatile," and "ill-tempered" have also been applied. Because nonverbal or low-verbal people can't easily communicate that they're hurting, they may also display these less pleasant behaviors, and it's not so easy to get treatment for the issues when the person can't tell you what hurts, when.
Then, too, the person may not even realize their suffering is abnormal. They may be so used to it that they don't even think to ask for help. I'm a highly verbal person, but I actually spent most of my childhood having regular constipation, which caused me pain on a regular basis. I wasn't aware this was unusual, and thus that issue continued right up to the point that I accidentally nuked my digestive tract and developed the opposite problem, which now lingers when I eat too much sugar or really don't eat a perfectly healthy diet.
One of the common themes I see in "my family's experience with autism" books and "fix your child's autism with my system" is the insistence that when the "problem behaviors" go away, the autism is cured or lessened. This is... mostly a misunderstanding, I'd bet. The child or adult doesn't act up as much, or act as unusually after This or That Technique is tried. The person is pronounced "not autistic any more," and the day is saved.
The change in the person's behavior is because their body is functioning more healthily, and therefore they are suffering less. When people don't suffer, they're less inclined to be angry, frustrated, and lash out at setbacks and smaller disruptions. Their behavior will change, because their internal state has improved. You also have a happier, healthier person, which is really the more important part if you ask me.
(Pst! If you like seeing the latest autism-relevant research, visit my Twitter, which has links and brief comments on studies that were interesting, but didn't get a whole Reading the Research article about them.)
Today's article underlines a point I think many parents miss, but is kind of obvious when you think about it.
First: all behavior is communication. When we talk about communication in a mainstream sense, we tend to be referring to a very narrow range of what communication actually is. Mainly, we're talking about speaking the country's dominant language, while following the rules the majority of the population follows. We might also be talking about what I'm doing here: writing and reading in said dominant language.
The thing is, communication is so much more than that. It's what actions a person takes. It's how they take those actions. It's pictures and graphs and tone of voice and other languages and personal slang. There are an absolutely dizzying number of ways people can communicate.
Calling any of that "problem behavior" is kind of ignoring the essential nature of that behavior. If it's a problem for you, then you should figure out what the behavior is communicating.
Non-verbal autistic people sometimes behave aggressively. This can be for a lot of reasons, from frustration with their situation, to despair in their life prospects, to the one this article is tracking: pain.
Anyone who's dealt with sufferers of chronic pain, or even been in a bad mood due to a headache or backache, shouldn't find this surprising. Being in pain, especially day after day, has real consequences for your mood and outlook. You can see this often in older people, whose bodies can cause them significant pain due to any number of ailments. The word I've often heard or such people is "crotchety," but "crabby," "volatile," and "ill-tempered" have also been applied. Because nonverbal or low-verbal people can't easily communicate that they're hurting, they may also display these less pleasant behaviors, and it's not so easy to get treatment for the issues when the person can't tell you what hurts, when.
Then, too, the person may not even realize their suffering is abnormal. They may be so used to it that they don't even think to ask for help. I'm a highly verbal person, but I actually spent most of my childhood having regular constipation, which caused me pain on a regular basis. I wasn't aware this was unusual, and thus that issue continued right up to the point that I accidentally nuked my digestive tract and developed the opposite problem, which now lingers when I eat too much sugar or really don't eat a perfectly healthy diet.
One of the common themes I see in "my family's experience with autism" books and "fix your child's autism with my system" is the insistence that when the "problem behaviors" go away, the autism is cured or lessened. This is... mostly a misunderstanding, I'd bet. The child or adult doesn't act up as much, or act as unusually after This or That Technique is tried. The person is pronounced "not autistic any more," and the day is saved.
The change in the person's behavior is because their body is functioning more healthily, and therefore they are suffering less. When people don't suffer, they're less inclined to be angry, frustrated, and lash out at setbacks and smaller disruptions. Their behavior will change, because their internal state has improved. You also have a happier, healthier person, which is really the more important part if you ask me.
(Pst! If you like seeing the latest autism-relevant research, visit my Twitter, which has links and brief comments on studies that were interesting, but didn't get a whole Reading the Research article about them.)
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