AUTISM SPECTRUM DISORDER ACROSS THE LIFESPAN

Lebanese American University

Autism and Human Development

AUTISM SPECTRUM DISORDER ACROSS THE LIFESPAN

Autism Spectrum Disorder Across the Lifespan

Introduction

Autism is a pervasive developmental disorder of the brain which

incidence is expanding worldwide as of the latest two centuries. Researchers

diverse in the explanation of this phenomenon as some believe it relies in

the current social fluctuations which might be triggering kids to have

infantile autism while others believe that it is only a matter of better

detection and more diagnosed cases. Either way, these increasing rates are

only indicating a persistant rise in the upcoming years.

Over 50 years of psychological studies about ASD haven’t yet

fathomed the hereditary and environmental factors affecting autism. It has

been noted that the disorder affects men twice more than women and

according to The Female Protective Effect Theory, women have an inborn

protection against it (Rujeedawa & H. Zaman, 2022). It’s most important

however, to regard autism in its developmental nature, as each case

develops in its own way dependently on the individual himself which makes

it harder for researchers to get to the understanding of the disorder as older

people with autism will have developed brain mechanisms that contribute to

the degradation of their situation.

AUTISM SPECTRUM DISORDER ACROSS THE LIFESPAN
AUTISM SPECTRUM DISORDER ACROSS THE LIFESPAN

Theories on Autism

ASD is a long-term "hidden ailment" that can affect people of all ages

and backgrounds. In 1943, Leo Kanner came up with examples of "early

infantile autism," separating it from psychosis and schizophrenia. Because

'autós' means self in Greek and 'ism' means state of being, Kanner's

catastrophic choice of the name 'autism' was designed to stress the

children's exceptional self-centeredness. Many of Kanner's discoveries have

shown to be correct, but his theories about essential aspects of the

syndrome, such as normal IQ, lack of connection to other physical issues,

and insufficient parenting/education, have not.

Autism is frequently associated with other disorders such as Down

syndrome, epilepsy, developmental syndromes such as Turners, Tuberous

Sclerosis, or metabolic abnormalities, ADHD, OCD, depression, anxiety, or

other mental illnesses.

In 1944, the Austrian Hans Asperger coined the term "autistic

psychopathy," which was based on his observations of four children and

paralleled Kanner's theory in some ways. It is currently recognized as

Asperger's Syndrome to avoid the term psychopathy and to distinguish it

from normal autism.

It's probably best to start with some myths about autism from the past:
AUTISM SPECTRUM DISORDER ACROSS THE LIFESPAN

 Autistic children never make eye contact, express affection, or

smile.

 Inside a child with autism, there is a normal child or genius yearning

to emerge.

• Autistic children do not speak, yet they could if they chose to.

• Autistic children have trouble interacting to classmates and adults,

and they are manipulative and egotistical.

• Autism is a mental health condition.

• Autism can be outgrown, and a child's growth does not automatically

imply that he or she is no longer autistic.

This is the PDD that has been studied the most out of all of the PDDs

(DSM III in 1980). The lack of consistency with other illnesses, the wide range

of syndrome expression, and variations in syndrome expression with age

have all hampered better definitions. In the great majority of cases, there is

no definite date of development (although 20 percent of parents report

normal development for first 1-2 years of life).

Anomalies in the genome on chromosome 15q11-q13 have been

detected in recent study into etiology based on twin and family examinations

(PWS & Angelman). There have also been discoveries of a number of genes

and chromosomal regions, including:

 FXR1 (20-60 percent of affected kids are autistic)

AUTISM SPECTRUM DISORDER ACROSS THE LIFESPAN

 15q11 -13

The amygdala, which helps the brain retain memories essential for

social learning, is considered to play a key role in fear situations, memory

consolidation, and the creation of substantial emotional reactions. The

amygdala has long been thought to be a cause of anxiety in people with

autism. According to David Amaral of the UC Davis MIND Institute, men and

boys with autism have less neurons in the amygdala (Journal of

Neuroscience, 2006). One notion is that autistic people's amygdalas have

fewer neurons. Another view is that autism is a degenerative condition that

develops later in life and results in the loss of neurons. Prior research has

shown that children with autism have bigger amygdala structures; in autistic

3 and 4-year-olds, a greater right amygdala volume has been linked to more

severe social communication difficulties. At the age of six, this predicts a

more severe clinical course and a poorer social-communicative result

(Munson et al., 2006). In early post-modern assessment studies of people

with autism, greater cell density in the amygdala was discovered (Rapin &

Katzman, 1998).In fact, the brains of autistic individuals have long been

suspected to be larger than non-autistic. More recent work (Courchesne,

2003) has demonstrated that at birth, children with autism, had smaller

heads than non-autistics but then showed sudden and excessive growth from

1-2 months and 6-14 months. By adolescence, the brain size would have

normalized. There appears to be an increase in the quantity of white matter

in the brains of autistic children along with growth in the cerebellum.

AUTISM SPECTRUM DISORDER ACROSS THE LIFESPAN

Autistic Spectrum Disorder

Autism must be viewed through the lens of development. The

symptoms and indicators are related to chronological and mental age. In the

majority of cases, they appear in the first year of life: many will struggle to

build a connection with their parents at 4-6 months and will struggle to

express common feelings. Some others, will start a drastic onset of

symptoms by the age of 2.

Some of the symptoms are for example their incapability to cry when

they wake up in the middle of the night which is normally a typical reaction

of kids in such a situation. They can either excessively like physical touch or

not at all. This determines who’s under-sensitive and who’s oversensitive.

Under-sensitives would shove their head to the wall and would hence really

need tight hugs. They require a lot of stimulus, in other terms, proper care

which accompanies the clinical treatment provided by professionals. When

they are over-sensitives, it means that they highly sense the stimulus

originated by the environment around them which pushed them to despise

loud noises, rough surfaces even eat crunchy food... It has been biologically

proven that when they are over-sensitive, for example, the sensation coming

from the activation of the vocal cords might cause them so much pain that

they’d rather do away with.

Progression of Autistic Spectrum Disorder Across the Lifespan

AUTISM SPECTRUM DISORDER ACROSS THE LIFESPAN

According to Communication in Autism by Joanne Arciuli and Jon Brock,

an autistic child will have a disordered development which for many include

Echolalia which is basically a state in which children just imitate sentences

they hear around them. This however might help them with recognizing and

learning words and phrase structures. The degree of functioning has a big

impact on the prognosis. Autistic children can be split into three categories

based on their school age:

1. Low Functioning: Verbal and nonverbal IQ of 70 or below, which affects

around half of the youngsters.

2. Mid-Functioning: Nonverbal IQ > 70, but verbal IQ 70, which affects

around 25% of youngsters.

3. High Functioning: Verbal and nonverbal IQ > 70, which accounts for

around a quarter of the children afflicted.

Some children with autism improve in adolescence, which is linked to a

positive adult outcome: activity levels drop, behavior becomes more

controlled, self-help abilities improve, communication improves, IQ remains

consistent, but they become more sociable overall.

AUTISM SPECTRUM DISORDER ACROSS THE LIFESPAN

Anxiety and sadness, on the other hand, are the most prevalent co-occurring
mental illnesses among people with autism. Their IQ at the age of 5 to 6
years, as well as their communication abilities, are known to be connected to
this result. Due to their lack of awareness of the rules of developing peer
connections, they will tend to form relationships with much older people.
Adults with autism are frequently capable of self-sufficiency and productive
employment.
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Treatment

Early intervention comes in two ways: either enrolling the child in a

private school or a center or private training. This depends purely on the

financial ability of the parents, the severity of the case and sometimes the

personal preference of the student at an older age. It’s called a spectrum

because non-autistic people are still on the normal side of the scale while

autistics, the more severe the symptoms are, the more they get on the

opposite side of the scale.

In centers, they usually don’t only work on academics but also on

social skills because autistic students lack certain social norms and actions.

Applied behavioral analysis, which focuses on teaching tiny, quantifiable

units of behavior in a systematic fashion, is also widespread. The

antecedents of problematic target behaviors are identified, and remedial

actions are taught. Typically, a command question is asked, and if required,

a hint or clue is offered. Correct replies are immediately rewarded, whereas

erroneous ones are ignored or corrected neutrally. For example, they don’t

know personal space and to address this issue, educators would put hula-

hoops on the ground and explain to their students that the personal space is

limited by the hula-hoops. They construct the concept of personal space in

concrete activities.

We might want to educate them via non-verbal communication, be it

visual illustration, technological aid or support such as text to speech or

AUTISM SPECTRUM DISORDER ACROSS THE LIFESPAN

picture to speech. Age-appropriate is very important for treatment which

they don’t call treatment but rather intervention since ASD isn’t a disease,

it’s an inborn condition that you learn to live around.

When it comes to autism, it’s a case-to-case technique. There’s a

variety of studies and research underwent that suggest many different ways

of working with it but at the end of the day, there is one thing that everyone

agrees on: not every single technique or tool works on every single autistic

person because the variety of the spectrum is huge when it comes to the

different age cases. It’s up to the teacher, parent, community… to figure out

what works with who.

Application to the Lebanese Setting

In the poor Arabic translation to autism, it is related to loneliness or

introversion, called “al.tawahood” however autistic people don’t like to be

alone, at least not all of them. In Lebanon, there are organizations for this

form of intervention, however in most cases, especially in the social-

economic disastrous situation of the country, poor parents tend to just

abandon their kids in whichever center that proclaims to be effective or

provide intervention for autistic children. Such institutions are bound by

traditional methods which are usually unethical and go beyond human rights.

Sometimes, parents also just keep them imprisoned at home, never

introduce them to society or claim them as their own, leaving them to

AUTISM SPECTRUM DISORDER ACROSS THE LIFESPAN

indulge their verbal and non-verbal violence. Other rare cases will try to take

care of them on their own.

AUTISM SPECTRUM DISORDER ACROSS THE LIFESPAN

References

Gary Weitzen; How Can I Keep My Child Safe? Understanding The Creep

Factor and the Hidden Curriculum; POAC Autism Services;

https://www.poac.net/blog/keeping-asd-kids-safe/

Gary Weitzen; High vs. Low Functioning Autism; POAC Autism Services;

https://www.poac.net/blog/high-vs-low-functioning-autism/

Gary Weitzen; Understanding and Explaining Autism to Children Resource

List; POAC Autism Services; https://poacwebsite.s3.amazonaws.com/wp-

content/uploads/2021/10/05144725/Resource-List-Sharing-and-Explaining-

Autism-to-Children_Final-Design-3.pdf

Ellen Notbohm; Ten Things Every Child With Autism Wishes You Knew; POAC

Autism Services; 2005,2008.https://s3.amazonaws.com/poacwebsite/wp-

content/uploads/2016/06/04193251/Ten-Things-Every-Child-with-Autism-

Wishes-You-Knew.pdf

Evidence-Based Practice and Autism in the Schools, A Guide To Providing

Appropriate Interventions To Students With Autism Spectrum Disorder;

National Autism Center; 2009. https://s3.amazonaws.com/poacwebsite/wp-

content/uploads/2016/06/04192257/

Evidence_Based_Practice_Autism_Schools.pdf

Temple Grandin; My Mind is a Web Browser: How People with Autism Think;

the Charles A. Dana Foundation; New York, NY; POAC Autism Services,
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2000.https://s3.amazonaws.com/poacwebsite/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/0

4191032/TempleGrandin-how-i-think.pdf