Anxiety exacerbates social communication problems in children with autism — and not the other way around, a new study suggests1. The results indicate that treating anxiety early on may ease communication problems later in life. Anxiety is common among people with autism2. The new study negates the p…

Amber Smith found out her son had been slapped on the bus only because her 9-year-old daughter had been there to witness it.Source: The Autism Site

Two new online resources help researchers predict how mutations alter protein structure. One plots the effects of mutations on regions of a protein1. The other identifies mutations that affect the sites where proteins interact2. To build the first resource, researchers created a program that determi…

A pair of maps that depict variation in the human genome may help reveal the genetic roots of autism. One map pinpoints ‘hot spots’ at which a process called recombination — which gives rise to genetic diversity — is most likely to occur1. The other details sites at which stretches of DNA are duplic…

Children born by cesarean delivery (C-section) appear to have a slightly increased chance of having autism, but the procedure itself does not underlie the association, a new study suggests. More likely, the link stems from environmental and genetic factors that contribute to both the need for a C-se…

October is National Disability Employment Awareness month. I struggled for years with employment; I am now gainfully employed going on 13.6 years in the mental health field and 18 years part-time as a professor of theology and speak at over 70 events a year. As I refined my talents and special inter…

Babies who are later diagnosed with autism have a slightly slower brain response to sound on a newborn hearing test than non-autistic babies do, according to a new study. The findings suggest that the screen, called the auditory brainstem response (ABR) test, could one day help clinicians identify a…

A form of autism marked by a distinctive pattern of brain overconnectivity arises from an excess of synapses, according to a new study in mice. The findings bolster the theory that autism subtypes have different biological roots and may require different treatment approaches. Autistic people have al…

A statement released by an influential panel of doctors has stirred a great deal of controversy.Source: The Autism Site

Some of the items on a common diagnostic test for autism may not translate well to African cultures, according to preliminary results from multiple teams. Two teams presented their unpublished results Friday at the 2017 Africa Regional International Meeting for Autism Research in Stellenbosch, South…

More recently, we have seen accessibility becoming more prominent in the gaming world. To make things a lot more accessible and easier, especially for visually impaired or blind gamers, Microsoft has filed for a patent design for a braille controller. This proposed controller will have paddles at th…

This past March, Canada’s health department changed the way it handles the huge amount of data that companies submit when seeking approval for a new drug, biological treatment or medical device — or a new use for an existing one. For the first time, Health Canada is making large chunks of this…

The network of researchers keeping tabs on autism prevalence in U.S. children plans to follow up with some of those children in adolescence, using new funds available from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The CDC-funded Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring (ADDM…

By Christa Holmans, Neurodivergent Rebel It was just after lunchtime as I started to feel the familiar stinging pain starting to creep in behind my eyes. It had been a few months since the company I worked for had moved into a new larger office upstairs. I’d already lost count of the migraines…