My own introduction to prompting and fading I was first introduced to the idea of prompting and fading when I co-ordinated a home based early learning program for my eldest son, Christopher, who is on the spectrum of autism. I soon came to appreciate how important these strategies were and are in…

Autistic children tend to rate cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) as less effective at treating their anxiety than their parents and clinicians do, according to a meta-analysis of 19 randomized clinical trials. The result, based on data from 833 autistic children up to 18 years old, raises concerns …

Guest post by Andréas RB Deolinda, BA, BSc. As an educational facilitator who has worked in special education... The post Benefits of Theater and Dramatherapy for Children with Autism appeared first on The Autism Site News. Source: The Autism Site

Since sensory differences became part of the diagnostic criteria for autism in 2013, an increasing number of autism researchers have been drawn to the thalamus, the egg-shaped sensory relay station nestled deep in the brain. The flurry of interest has built a case for the thalamus as an important se…

Adding non-neuronal brain cells called microglia to cortical organoids speeds up the rate at which their neurons mature, increases the synchronization of their firing and appears to reduce cell stress, according to a new study. These changes, as well as others, help the clusters of cultured cells re…

Yahoo Sports, a leading destination for sports fans, today announced the debut of a short documentary produced by Yahoo about its All Blind Fantasy League (ABFL)— a group of sports fanatics who use assistive technology, like screen readers, with the Yahoo Fantasy app to connect with their passion fo…

Sebastian Kessler, a 17-year-old teen with autism, has a daily routine that helps him feel comfortable. But when... The post Non-Verbal Teen With Autism Finds His Voice Through Art appeared first on The Autism Site News. Source: The Autism Site

The 2021 Society for Neuroscience annual meeting (SfN) wrapped up yesterday, after four packed days of virtual presentations. The in-person portion of the event was called off a month ago because of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. A slew of technical glitches plagued the online offerings, but Spec…

Treatments that counteract the effects of a mutation in a top autism-linked gene in mice increase the animals’ sociability in adulthood, according to a new unpublished study. Researchers presented the findings virtually at the 2021 Society for Neuroscience annual meeting. The results are based on mi…

Hello, and welcome to the Community Newsletter! I’m your host, Chelsey B. Coombs, Spectrum’s engagement editor. We’re beginning this week with a paper on autistic researcher strengths by Aimee Grant, senior research officer in public health at Swansea University, and Helen Kara, honorary senior rese…

Two new unpublished studies presented virtually at the 2021 Society for Neuroscience annual meeting offer insights into synapse development: One maps the trajectories of synapse formation across nine species, and the other characterizes the earliest synapses to arise in the human brain. The findings…

Traveling and seeing the world is on a lot of people’s bucket lists. But what makes traveling even... The post Mom & Autistic Son Write Children’s Book To Inspire Families To Travel Together appeared first on The Autism Site News. Source: The Autism Site

Register for the next Spectrum webinar, featuring Ari Ne’eman, a doctoral student in health policy at Harvard University and president and co-founder of the Autistic Self Advocacy Network. Ne’eman will speak about ways to assess clinical progress in autistic people that don’t also promote that they …

The post Spotted around the web: Antisense therapies, mosaic mutations, researcher productivity appeared first on Spectrum | Autism Research News. Source: Spectrum News