Recognizing Autism Symptoms
Autism is considered to be the most serious disorder among Autism Spectrum Disorders. Autism is triggered by neurological dysfunctions, in some cases causing dramatic, irreversible damage in behaviors, social interactions, communication skills and even physical development. Although people who suffer from autism don't always seem to be different from normal people, the presence of abnormalities is revealed by the way they socially interact, communicate, and learn.
Autism symptoms can usually be spotted during the first years of life. Despite the fact that autistic people share common features of the disorder, it is wrong to generalize the aspects of autism. People with autism, just like normal people, develop unique, distinctive personalities and have different ways of understanding and relating to the world. Furthermore, people with autism sometimes have high, above average IQ's. Autistic people usually have good mathematical skills and good memory.
People with autism tend to experience emotional problems at different stages of their lives due to their evasive, withdrawing behaviors and they often become depressed. An obvious autism symptom is the predisposition towards stereotype, repetitive behaviors, and the preference for activities that involve maintaining a certain routine. People with autism strongly resist change and they are usually very tidy and organized. They categorize personal objects, maintaining everything in a very strict order. It is thought that autistic people refuse to engage in spontaneous activities due to their poor adaptability to new situations.
The National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities proposes the following autism symptoms in identifying the presence of the disorder:
- poor emphatic skills, inability of understanding and coping with others' distress;
- inability of relating to other people, lack of interest in other persons; it is a fact that autistic people have behaviors oriented towards the self;
- avoidance of social interactions, refusal of making eye contact, isolation from the external world;
- difficulties in expressing feelings or understanding other people's emotions;
- poor responsiveness when called by their name, refusal of redirecting their attention towards people when asked to;
- difficulties in expressing their needs and desires;
- repeating ideas within a conversation, incoherent speech;
- unusual reactions to external stimuli like sounds, tastes or smells;
- deterioration of the skills they once possessed.
Children with autism need special care and attention and appropriate treatment in order to minimize the harm caused by their disorder. It is vital to pay attention to autism symptoms when suspecting that a child may be suffering from the disorder. Children with autism better deal with the disorder if they have been diagnosed with autism at an early age.
Adults with autism are able to take care of themselves, especially if they suffer from milder forms of the disorder. They can sometimes be successfully integrated in the society and some autistic people can even handle a job. However, many people with autism have unpredictable behaviors and need to be under the constant care of their families. Autistic people that have more severe forms of the disorder are usually institutionalized and kept under strict monitoring.
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Pay Careful Attention to Potential Signs of Autism
Parents suspecting that their child might be suffering from autism should pay attention to any sign that may reveal the presence of the disorder. The signs of autism are best to be discovered during the child's first year of life, in order to minimize the harm caused by the disorder. Signs of autism can sometimes be spotted from the moment of birth, the child manifesting little responsiveness to stimuli, failing to anticipate movement and paying little attention to their mothers or caretakers.
It is very important to quickly see the first signs of autism, as this disorder is known to cause serious damage to the child's behavior, social interactions, communication skills and adaptability. Children with autism develop slower than normal children of the same age. Autistic children are also more vulnerable to some illnesses and conditions, such as allergies, respiratory insufficiency, digestive disorders and so on.
Autistic children are different from normal children judging by aspects like personality, skills and abilities. Their behavioral development is affected by the particularities of many environmental factors. It is difficult to diagnose an infant or a small baby with autism, as the signs of autism are very subtle at such an early age. Sometimes, however, parents are able to detect the presences of certain abnormalities in the development of their child. Although parents aren't always able to tell exactly what makes their child different from other children of the same age, it is very important when they discover such behavioral particularities. At the opposite pole, some parents fail to notice any abnormalities in their children's behavior, thinking that they might just develop slower than others.
An interesting form of autism is regressive autism. Many children seem to develop normally until they reach certain periods of their early childhood, when the first signs of autism suddenly occur. At this point, children experience a deterioration of their social interaction and communication skills.
The signs of autism in the child's first years of life are:
- poor responsiveness to their own name and selective responsiveness to sounds (children with autism may ignore certain sounds, while responding to others of the same intensity);
- difficulties in joint attention (autistic children don't usually follow the movements indicated by their parents and refuse to concentrate on objects that are shown to them);
- poor imitational behaviors (unlike normal babies, small babies with autism don't often imitate facial expressions and gestures like hand waving, smiling, making faces);
- lack of understanding of others' feelings, difficulties in relating with other people (autistic children have poor emphatic skills and are often unable to show compassion to persons in distress; in most cases they ignore their parents when they fake an injury, showing no facial expressions that may reveal their concern);
- the inability of understand and play imagination games or "pretend" games (normal children like to pretend for instance that they are feeding a doll or they imagine themselves to be someone else; children with autism show no interest to such games, failing to imagine things to be different than they really are).
It is vital to pay attention to potential signs of autism in the development of small children. If a child is diagnosed with a form of autism at an early age, there are better chances of overcoming the undesirable effects of the disorder.
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Malign Effects of Child Autism
Autism is considered to be a serious neurological disorder, causing dramatic changes in behavior and affecting social interactions, communication skills and adaptability. The first signs of autism can either be spotted at birth or later in childhood. Child autism is characterized by refusal of social interactions, inability of anticipating movement, poor eye contact, lack of interest towards mothers or caretakers, inability of engaging in imitational acts, preference for repetitive, stereotype activities.
Child autism is different from one child to another. Although autistic children have common behavioral features, every child with autism develops in a different, unique way. Child autism affects the perception of persons and objects and some autistic children may engage in behaviors that lead to self-injury (some autistic children unwillingly bang their heads against their crib). Child autism is also characterized by low adaptation skills and strong resistance to changes in their activities or behaviors. Autism occurs to persons regardless of their IQ. Autistic children sometimes have good skills with numbers, excelling in areas like mathematics. However, it is a fact that all children diagnosed with autism have reduced emotional intelligence.
Child autism can determine either hyper-active or hypo-active behaviors. While some children are very impulsive and difficult to calm down, other children are very still and passive. The most relevant signs of child autism are: avoidance of social interactions and low responsiveness to smile, voice or gestures (many autistic children avoid making any kind of eye contact and sometimes ignore the presence of their parents or caretakers), poor "baby talk", difficulties in oral speech, (autistic children rarely "initiate" dialogue), predisposition towards repetitive gestures and activities (clapping their hands, waving their heads back and forth, excessive swinging). Autistic children also focus their attention on some particular toys, ignoring everything else around them (unlike normal children that are easily distracted, autistic children ignore external stimuli when concentrating upon a certain activity).
Child autism is also revealed by the inability to play imaginative, "pretend" games. While normal children often pretend to be someone else when playing, or imagine new ways of playing with their toys, autistic children are usually unable to do the same thing. Also, child autism is characterized by the inability to distinguish danger; children with autism seem to be unafraid of dangerous, threatening situations. Emphatic skills are also poor in case of autistic children; they don't seem to care about other people in distress, feeling no compassion for them.
The causes of child autism and many other Autism Spectrum Disorders are still unknown. Scientists believe that there are certain genetic factors responsible for the development of autism, but the genes that cause autism haven't yet been identified. Autism has a pronounced hereditary character. Parents with an autistic child in the family are most likely to have another child with the same disorder. An interesting aspect of child autism is the larger numbers of boys affected by the disorder, compared to the numbers of girls with autism.
The signs of child autism must be spotted in time, in order to minimize the risks of further behavioral, cognitive and physical damage. It is vital to correctly diagnose autism at an early age, thus facilitating the process of recovery and preventing severe behavioral deterioration. Also, children with autism need a lot of care and attention, as they tend to engage in self-injurious activities.
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