Reading the Research: Measuring Quality of Life

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 focuses on quantifying the quality of life for autistic people.  Essentially, the researchers wanted to know peoples' demographics (age, race, household income, etc), exact diagnoses, medications, activities and employment statuses, type of insurance if any, and various other kinds of info.  

You can look at the data yourself by going here and opening the two Word documents listed under "Supporting Information."  Some of the results were sobering, like the fact that 71.8% of the surveyed autistic adults' households make less than $30,000 a year, and 65.9% of them had comorbid psychiatric diagnoses (depression, anxiety disorders, and other mental health issues except for seizure disorders).

I was pleased to see the researchers did apparently make a point to talk to autistic adults as well as parents of autistic children, both in designing their survey and when acquiring their data.  That's sadly abnormal in the history of autism research, but these folks, at least, took a step in the right direction. 

It seems the researchers did a decent job putting together the survey and data, but it somewhat surprises me, when reading the questions (also found at the second link above), that they seem so... basic.  Many of the questions are basic demographics.  There's some interest in IQ, sleep, religiosity, relationships status, and living situation, but in general the questions are quite simple.  They're multiple choice, Likert scale, or closed-ended questions, for the most part.  

I guess I'd kind of hoped autism research would have gotten further along than this, by now.  I've been alive for three decades, and the concept of Asperger's Syndrome/HFA/those of us who blend into the neurotypical population better has been known in the United States for more than two and a half decades.  That's a lot of time and money wasted looking for a nonexistent cure and a lot of time pointedly ignoring the needs of families and autistic individuals.  

Better late than never, I guess?  Hopefully this measure can be used widely to help autistic people and families develop healthier, happier, more meaningful lives.  Perhaps better, more in-depth measures can be developed as well.  

(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.)

Handling the Isolation: an Autistic's Advice

I ran across an article by Maxfield Sparrow pointing out, quite rightly, that I and other autistic people have more experience being alone and being isolated than most neurotypical people.  I was a social outcast for most of my schooling, which led to practicing self-isolation as they describe in this post.  I now have quite a bit of practice managing myself and these situations.  So now there's a pandemic and everyone has to be isolated.  Let's talk about handling isolation, shall we?

Sociability via the Internet

First and foremost, the Internet has lots of social options.  Just because you shouldn't go see people in person, doesn't mean you have to be a hermit.

If you feel alone and need people to talk to, know that there are thousands of communities full of people who likely feel similarly and are also reaching out for support.  Look into communities around your hobbies and interests.

Reddit is a good place to start for this.  There are multiple autism-related Reddit communities, but there are also places for knitting, book clubs, parenting, cooking, TV shows...  basically, if you can imagine a topic, there's probably a community somewhere for it.  Reddit is not your only option for finding these communities, either.  A bit of time spent Googling your interests can turn up a variety of options, like forums, IRC channels, YouTube personalities, and how-to guides.

Discord is another option.  While it was initially built for video game communities, there are now communities for creative writing, webcomics, city areas (here's one for Grand Rapids), gardening, and even knitting.  You can chat by text or voice with people about all kinds of things.  If you play video games, you can even stream your game to your friends in a virtual hangout.  I'll expand on this below.

I do not recommend upping your hours on social media, like Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook.  In my research and personal experience, time spent on social media tends to result in feeling worse about yourself and the world.  They also tend to run experiments on you, sell your data to whoever will pay pennies for it, and significantly limit the information they feed back to you.

Instead of passively following your friends and family on social media, consider calling them on the phone, texting them, emailing them, or using Skype, Facetime, or Discord to video call every once a week or so.  I personally prefer emails or text due to the suffering the phone causes me, but you may find the phone a much more satisfying option.  People are different, and that's okay!

Finally, you can have a virtual party or hang out time.  You don't have to give up your movie night, board game night, or other night out just because you shouldn't leave your home.

Movies and TV: Rather than all gathering at a single house, each person can relax in their own home yet watch a movie or TV show together.  The classic example of this is the Chrome extension Netflix Party, which syncs your screen with all of your friends' screens, so nobody gets surprised first.  But, there are actually a lot of options for having this kind of experience.  Binge watch a favorite TV show with your friends, or try out a new show together!

Board Games: Did you know you can play board games online?  Specifically, did you know there's a virtual tabletop application called Tabletop Simulator, in which you can play games like Risk, Battleship, Settlers of Cataan, Apples to Apples, Clue, and thousands more.  There's also an app called Tabletopia that works on phones and does the same kind of thing.  If you love board games and miss being with your friends, why not give these a try?

Video Games: Many gamers already make use of technology like this, but Twitch, Discord, Mixer, Periscope, Livestream, and a ton of other services offer the ability to stream your gameplay to an audience.  You can show off a favorite game, or introduce your friends to something new.

Not interested in being on display?  That's okay, you can play with your loved ones instead!  There are hundreds of cooperative video games.  Here's a link to a drawing party game that's free for the next few weeks.  There are also lots of more indepth games, like Path of Exile, which is a fantasy online multiplayer game.  Or Terraria, an open world survival/exploration game.  If you have a Nintendo Switch, Animal Crossing: New Horizons just came out.  You can escape to your own island, explore and reshape the place as you like, build a community of cheerful animal friends, and relax to a great soundtrack.  There's even an option to visit your friends' islands, so you can play together too.

Knitting Group/Book Club/Interest Group: Facetime, Discord, Skype, Zoom, Google Hangouts, and WhatsApp all have group call functionality.  Get everyone the same app, set up your phones and/or webcams, and get out your books/knitting needles/D&D character sheets.

With most of the world on lockdown during this pandemic crisis, lots of people are turning to the Internet to meet their social needs.  Thankfully, there's a ton of stuff for everyone.  If you're starved for people, now's the best time to look into your options!  There are so many ways to spend time with your friends and family without worrying about infecting them, and new and interesting friends could be right around the corner.  The Internet has groups who love your hobbies as much as you do, just waiting for you to join them.

A last but important note: If you are suffering any form of mental illness, and the isolation is making it worse, there are options available for you.  Besides the hotlines, many therapists are doing their work via phone or video call, so it's worth it to check with your therapist and see if you can get an appointment without risking infection.  At least two of my friends have already had appointments with their therapists over the phone, so the tele-health option does work.

Remember: Depression, anxiety, and other forms of mental illness are real and legitimate forms of pain, just like broken legs and bruises.  Help is available to you, and you do matter.

Self-Care and Self-Improvement

Second, consider this time a chance to do some things for yourself you never seemed to have time for.

Self-care often falls by the wayside in the hustle and bustle of life.  However, it's extremely important, especially in trying times like these.  Read an old favorite book, or take a new one from your stack, if you have one.  Schedule some time to drink tea or coffee without looking at your phone.  Take a luxurious bath, or start a video game you've been meaning to play.  Call friends or family and talk for a while.  Play a silly phone game you love for a few minutes.  Listen to old music you love, or new music you've been meaning to look into.  I've spent some of the time rereading old favorite book series and trashy pop literature, because it's comfortable and I need the comfort right now.

Whatever relaxes you and feeds your soul, make time every day to do those things.

You can also try new activities. Have you wanted to take more walks outside?  It's getting warmer, and you can keep your distance from others while you do so. There are also free exercise classes of all kinds on Youtube, like aerobics, tai chi, yoga, and more.  Or perhaps there's a subject you've been meaning to learn about?  There are free Ivy League classes available online.  You can learn to code in HTML, CSS, SQL, Javascript, and a lot more languages for free.

Have you meant to try meditation or some kind of mindfulness to help with the stress of life, but there never seemed to be a good time to practice?  Pick up Headspace or Calm.  Both of these are quality apps with significant sections of free content.  They can help you learn to manage the stress of the isolation in a healthy manner, and give you a break from the worry about the future and the present, and the fear- and frustration-laden cycles the news is going through.

Cooking is another thing you can do at home.  Since grocery shopping is an essential activity, you can try recipes you wouldn't normally have time for.  Make a big batch of soup or a favorite dish and freeze some for later.  Stretch your horizons by making a vegetarian dish, or even something dairy-free or gluten-free.  Try new ingredients, or pick up a new kind of spice or seasoning.  The Internet is full of recipes.  I particularly like Budget Bytes, but I also reference the megasite All Recipes as well.  With some time on Google, you may be able to find specific sites that cater to your dietary needs.

Overwhelmed?  Can't think of anything to cook?  There's a website for that.  Actually, there's several, so here's another.  Click the ingredients you have available, and the website will show you links to recipes using those ingredients.

Finally, remember that you can easily keep a six foot distance from others outside.  As the weather warms in the northern hemisphere, public parks can be your safe place to go when cabin fever sets in.  Spending time in green spaces, such as gardens, forests, and public parks, has been repeatedly shown to improve stress levels and quality of life overall, so why not stop by your local park?  You could even meet up with a friend and chat while keeping a safe distance from each other.

Whatever your interests, there is something for you.  Stay safe out there!

Reading the Research: Sociability and Giving Autistic People a Chance

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 is lengthy, but includes multiple studies about autistic sociability.  

For years, autism has been defined as an individualistic deficiency.  Which is to say, the typical narrative is: "That child/adult is autistic, and therefore they have difficulties like problems reading social cues and abnormal eye contact."  The focus is on the autistic person, and specifically, that person's weaknesses.

No mention is made of our strengths, nor is there a care for our interests, our enthusiasm, and the focus that allows us to become experts at our chosen fields.  Nothing about what makes valuable as people.  The medical model is only interested in deficits and weaknesses.

The research shows that not only are we more than our weaknesses, it also overthrows the medical model's stereotype of autistic people.  We are sociable, like typically developing humans.  We have empathy.  

Below the headline, there's a quote from a team of researchers: "Style, not substance, drives negative impressions of the social life of people on the autism spectrum."  This is from a study cited in the article.  

It appears the communication issues that people experience when an autistic-neurotypical interaction occurs are more an issue of presentation.  We don't appear as appealing or personable of a social partner as a neurotypical person would appear to be.  However, the content of those interactions, how fulfilling and pleasant the conversations were, was rated equally with autistic people as it was typically developing people.  

Essentially, the stigmas people hold about autistic people are far more damaging to our social lives than the actual inexperience with reading social cues or physical communication difficulties.

(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.)

Types of Stigma: Associative Stigma

Type 5: Stigma by Association

Stigma by Association occurs when the effects of stigma are extended to someone linked to a person with autism.  This can also be known as "courtesy stigma," "affiliate stigma," and "associative stigma."  This form of stigma can affect anyone around the autistic person: parents, friends, siblings, even significant others and spouses.  It has been noted to be a problem many parts of the world, including China and India as well as in the United States. 

This stigma is most often seen in the isolating effect on a family with one or more autistic individuals.  The autistic person, perhaps a small child, but even an older dependent, is seen as a burden or even a danger.  As a result, the family is not invited to social gatherings, the parents are perhaps told to "control their child," and members of the family may even be shunned in school, at work, or at the grocery store. 

It's as if being related to an autistic person somehow makes the family (or other individuals) irrevokably different and other.  This is, of course, utter nonsense.  Just as an autistic person, having received their diagnosis, is no different than they were before, the associated people are no different for their relationships with that person. 

The issue is somewhat confounded by the fact that autism somewhat runs in families.  Autistic traits can often be found in our parents and our siblings, which can then underline others' judgmentalness and seemingly make acceptable the alienation of those people.  All forms of stigma are unjust, of course.  This particular stigma blindly ignores the value of neurodiversity in favor of blindly idealizing some imagined "normalcy."  In reality no person is normal. 

Typically the way families fight the isolation is by forming or joining support groups and other safe havens.  Local places like Autism Support of Kent County will sometimes offer parent support groups or local directories to health care, lawyers, respite care, and other inclusive businesses.  More national or regional operations, like The Arc and The Autism Society in the United States, offer immediate information as well as more regional information and directories.

In these inclusive places, the norms are different.  If your kid is having a meltdown, the other adults in the room are likely to be understanding rather than myopically insisting you "control your child" or some other idiotic variation. In such places, the alienation isn't so powerful, and families can feel more free and able to be themselves.

Another way to fight this stigma is to educate your community.  One family in my church basically went in front of a microphone during a church event and gave the "our lives with autism" speech to all those listening.  They educated the congregation about their personal struggles as well as establishing connections and support within the church.  This was incredibly brave of them, and it took a lot of energy to do. 

This kind of effort is difficult and not always possible for families with autistic individuals, because energy and time are often such limited resources.  However, their effort helped pave the way for other families with autistic or neurodiverse kids to find connections.  It raised awareness about these issues overall, which resulted in more church discussion on the subject.  And in some ways, it normalized my adult autistic existence in the church. 

Regardless of what way you choose to fight this stigma, finding or making inclusive groups is important.  Managing life with additional challenges is hard enough.  Don't do it alone.  

Reading the Research: Virtually Social

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 is ostensibly about the coronavirus and how to handle the social distancing involved with preventing its spread, but honestly... it applies more broadly to any situation where people are isolated, especially autistic peoples' general lives.  

Autistic people are more likely to be isolated because we're different, and some neurotypical people and systems simply don't accept that.  We therefore find our communities online, and tend to have very few in person relationships.  For some people, that's enough.  For others, it isn't.  

This article has some suggestions for healthy online social activity.  In some cases, they're cringy: eating dinner over video chat with someone you met over a dating app seems like a recipe for disaster, frankly.  As if the sounds of chewing weren't bad enough in person, now you could hear them amplified over a video call, with the clink of silverware and glasses!

Some of them aren't bad, though.  Sending a one-minute kindness, like a genuine compliment or expression of gratitude, tends to make both the sender and the receiver happier.  Expressing gratitude, especially regularly, has been linked repeatedly to better mental health.  

I think many autistic people already have down the idea of networking with interest groups.  We can really get into our hobbies and interests, and being part of groups who are also interested in those things can be really fulfilling. There are various communities around autism itself, including several Reddit boards and other organizations.  

I looked into the Tools they linked.  TableTopics and The And seems like products you pay money for.  They're sets of questions on durable paper, which you can reference at the table to start conversations.  The cost isn't great for people without a lot of income to begin with.  Still, they're options, I guess.  

Ikaria, Cocoon, Monaru, and Squad look like they're trying to be Facebook killers.  Which, Facebook needs to die, so that's fine with me.  Of the four, only Squad seems to be publicly available, and it looks like it markets to you the same way Facebook does.  I'll hold out for one of the other three, maybe.

(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.)

Types of Stigma: Label Avoidance

Type 4: Label Avoidance

Label Avoidance is when a person chooses not to seek out a professional or school diagnosis, therapy, or even community support to avoid being assigned a stigmatizing label.

You can find this behavior in both parents and adults.  It derives from the other types of stigma.  When people have mistaken ideas of what autism is, what it means for the future, and what autistic people are like, they can be very closed-minded to even the thought of being autistic themselves, or someone they love being autistic.

The classical example of this is the parents of an autistic child noticing their child is different, taking the child to the doctor, receiving the suggestion to get them screened for autism, and promptly going home declaring, "well that's clearly not it, that doctor is a hack."  This, and variations thereof, are repeated endlessly in "my family's experience with autism" books.  Naturally, ignoring a developmental disability does not make it go away.

Usually it's the mother that gets past the reluctance first.  She sees her child struggling and understands that something is up, regardless of how she feels about the label.  She eventually takes the child for testing, and receives the label.  There may then be a period of anger, resistance, and mourning while the parents adjust their expectations for their child and come to grips with reality... but this mourning is often overblown.  The stigma about autism is that it destroys lives and the child can never have anything close to a "normal life."  (I have Opinions about "a normal life" and its expectations, by the way.)

You can also find this behavior in autistic adults and teens.  There are several reasons for this.

First, there's the same basic misconception that parents start out with: "If I acknowledge this difference and receive this diagnosis, my life [my child's life] as I've dreamt it will be over and I'll [they'll] be confined to an institution."  The reality is that a diagnosis doesn't change who the person is, nor does it change their capabilities.  It's simply a word or some words that you can use to start understanding yourself or someone else, or even use to acquire support in doing what you want to do with your life.

Then there's the fact that autism has been used as an insult in some circles (including in online video games) to describe people who are being thoughtless, rude, stupid, cruel, or otherwise acting intolerably.  While these adjectives are a poor description of most autistic people, this alternative definition can fuel a rejection of the psychological diagnosis.

There's also the deep end of, "I'm a person (not a cripple/weird/whatever) and I want to be treated like everyone else." Often, we, like any person, want to succeed on our own merit.  After years of being expected to act "normal," autistic people may reject any label that would acknowledge the impossibility of that expectation.  Or even after acquiring the label, refuse to use it in college or in the workforce (when we typically have a chance to make our own decisions for the first time).

In general, because of how this stigma and the other stigmas work, I tend to only tell people to seek out a diagnosis if they think it'll help, and not bother if they're not sure or think it'd be negative.  In a perfect world, the diagnosis would only help people and give them a path forward, a community, and a better understanding of themselves.  In the world we live in, all these stigmas and more exist, and we have to do the best we can under the circumstances. 

Reading the Research: Tracking Down Sensory Sensitivities

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 is a highly technical look into a theory of sensory hypersensitivity.  Sensory differences are commonly found in autistic people, especially hyper (over) sensitivity, where the person experiences sensations like noise, touch, or smell much more strongly than others.  

The obvious example is how I can hear basically every noise in the house even though almost all of them are irrelevant.  Really, my house creaks sometimes when there are temperature differentials.  This is not useful information, and I shouldn't need to consciously remember that.  Also other people sometimes have conversations that don't include me, which is perfectly normal, and I neither want nor need to hear them.  

This explanation (and excuse for me to gripe) aside, it appears a team at Massachusetts IT is closing in on why my brain does hypersensitivity thing to me.  The key is a protein named Shank3, which supports your brain's internal communication.  

I was surprised to see the Shank3 name again, since usually it's brought up in the context of specially designed mice who entirely lack the protein to test this or that medical intervention.  The idea is that these designer mice can stand in for human subjects, since you can do really risky things to mice in the name of science, but not to humans.  These Shank3 knockout mice display symptoms somewhat similar to "autistic symptoms," ie: avoidance of social interaction and repetitive behaviors.  

They used these designer mice and tested whether they would react to very small amounts of input to their whiskers: stimulation so minimal that unmodified mice wouldn't detect it.  The designer mice did detect it, which suggested strongly that these mice also have hypersensitivity.  With that established, the team looked at their neurology and found that parts of the brain are hyperactive.  

Interestingly, they did a second round with a different designer breed of mice.  This version had the proper genetics to produce Shank3, and proper levels of that protein, BUT they designed it so they could turn off a single part of the brain's ability to use the Shank3 protein.  That part of the brain, naturally, was the sensory bits.  The results were identical: same hypersensitivity and hyperactivity in the brain.  

The hope with all this is to figure out how to counter this hypersensitivity for people who are tortured by it, especially in a more targeted manner.  The article points out that sedatives exist, but they're not really ideal for day-to-day use since they affect the whole brain.

Personally, I'd like the ability to just take something and have my brain stop informing me of every errant noise.  It can be really horrifying, draining, and frustrating, especially in a busier place like the mall or a fitness facility or a school.

As a last, somewhat amusing-to-me note: this research suggests strongly that the designer breed of mouse, the Shank3 knockout mouse, is not in fact simulating an autistic human, but a human with hypersensitivities.  I can't begin to tell you how much research that throws into question.  While it's true that many autistic people suffer hypersensitive senses, many have hyposensitivities (undersensitivities, compared to hypersensitivity's oversensitivity) or a mix of both.  Or neither.

Sometimes, that's science for you.  Mistakes are made, and they're not found for years.  Science is self-correcting, so future research can be built on this new understanding and better, more accurate, more useful results obtained.  Hopefully sooner rather than later.

(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.)

Types of Stigma: Perceived Stigma

Type 3: Perceived Stigma

Perceived Stigma is the belief that others have negative beliefs (or Public Stigma) about autistic people.  This goes hand in hand with the previous type, Self-Stigma, because humans tend to believe that others think the same way they do.  

So if you believe autism is the Autism Speaks' brand of evil possessing demon, you tend to also assume others believe this as well.  If you happen to be autistic and you believe this, even unwillingly, it can feel like others believe you're the devil incarnate.  Needless to say, this is incredibly destructive to a person's wellbeing and ability to trust and enjoy other people.

I haven't run into a lot of autistic people that believe they're possessed by an autism-devil.  What I do tend to see is people that self-sabotage or at least have beliefs that hold them back from living their best lives.  They have internalized significant self-stigma, and then make the classical human error of assuming everyone else believes the same things.

So rather than saying, "I'm evil and everyone believes I'm evil," they might say, "I'm incapable of holding a job because I'm autistic and everyone knows that, so there's no point in trying to get a job."  The person will then only halfheartedly apply for jobs, not seek out opportunities, and even not take advantage of options directly in front of them.

Or they may hide their diagnosis, believing, "I'm terrible/worthless/incapable/a failure because I'm autistic and if anyone finds out I'm autistic, they'll believe I'm terrible/worthless/incapable/a failure also."  This also crosses into next time's stigma, Label Avoidance.

You can also see this stigma in parents of autistic children.  When your kid is having a noisy meltdown in a public place, the typical assumption made by the parents of that kid is that everyone is staring and making the assumption that it's a tantrum because those parents are lazy and terrible.  This assumption may or may not be true.  People do tend to look at a source of noise, and there are certainly enough personal stories of passersby accusing the parents of poor parenting.  (An aside: "Control your child" is about the dumbest demand I've ever heard, given that a child is literally a small human and all humans have free will.)

In all honesty, though?  My understanding is that a lot of parents see that meltdown situation and go, "been there, done that, it sucks to be those poor people."  I personally (not a parent) just tend to pay as little attention as possible.  The screams hurt my ears and wreck my brain, but if it's a tantrum I don't want to signal the kid that this is an acceptable method of getting what they want.  If it's a meltdown, more attention won't help but could very well make the meltdown worse.

The trick about this type of stigma is that it's not required to be accurate.  There is a significant public stigma around autism.  However, most people don't have a full or even partial understanding of that stigma, or even the ideas behind it.  Most people just don't know a lot about autism at all, in fact.  Autism, in addition, is often an invisible disability.  So assuming people are automatically demonizing you isn't productive or even accurate.

Reading the Research: Brain Connectivity

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 is a refinement in the "autism is a neurological condition" theory.  There is, of course, much debate about what exactly autism is.  Various people will contend it's a medical problem, a neurological difference, or in some special cases, "doesn't exist at all."  While much of this is semantics and depends on how many symptoms you decide are "autism," the fact remains that there is a neurological component to whether someone's autistic or not.  

Our past understanding of neurological disorders is that a specific part of the brain might be damaged or malfunctioning.  There are some really interesting cases of people with severed corpora collosa (singular: corpus collosum) being able to simultaneously draw two entirely different things, one with each hand.  The corpus collosum is the part of the brain that connects the left and right halves.  It's sometimes surgically cut to preserve a patient's life, such as when they suffer repeated, massive seizures.  

There's also the story of Phineas Gage, the man who survived a railroad spike flying through his skull but suffered major personality changes as a result of all that brain damage.  The part of the brain most affected was the prefrontal cortex, which is thought to contain our personality and some memory capabilities.  Interestingly, it appears the personality changes may have been temporary.  Presumably the wonders of neuroplasticity kicked in and his brain rewired itself as best it could.  He lived another 12 years and apparently returned to at least some kind of normal life.

Instead of pointing to a specific part of the brain and saying, "there, that's what makes you autistic!" it appears that it's more a question of which parts are connected how well.  This is a step forward from Dr. Grandin's discussion of the specific parts of her brain that are larger or smaller in her book The Autistic Brain.  While individual differences absolutely exist, if the brain isn't well-connected to a specific part, it won't perform that part's functions as well as a neurotypical person's brain would.

I laughed a bit when I read, "Dr. Astle said that one implication of their work is that it suggests that interventions should be less reliant on diagnostic labels."  Unless you're an insurance company or new/haven't been paying attention to this sort of thing, this is staggeringly obvious.  To quote Dr. Stephen Shore for the umpteenth time, "If you've met one person with autism, you've met one person with autism."  Autism is a trashbin diagnosis, and it spans a lot of different people with a lot of different needs, symptoms, and personalities.  Trying to insist on a treatment for a patient without regard for their actual symptoms is stupid.

At any rate, I was pleased to see this study, and hope further research will develop from their findings.  

(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.)