<Daily Mail Alert> Autism linked to high achieving parents

[MincePieFlavouredVoidka]

Here

Well I am counted out for a start :) Ancestry wise fishermen and miners, no college no uni just good workers. Artistic yes all my family are good craftsmen and artistic but thats as far as it goes. We are all self taught in what ever goal or job we went for. So dont quite know what he is guessing at.

There is a genetic link - amongst families where the broader autism phenotype is apparent and there are often multiple cases of autism amongst siblings. This is the type of autism that SBC researches.

Then there are simplex families such as mine. Official definition of a simplex family - one child affected who has male siblings who are not affected. Tick. Often regressive, no autism in the family, often severely affected, no broader autism phenotype in the family. Now there may be genetic predisposition to some sort of regression (such as something wrong with the immune system) but it's not heritable in the sense of autism traits being inherited.

SBC talks about 'autism' but as Leonie says he is only talking about one subtype of autism.

If you came into our house you would see there are not many systemisers to be found here

It's good I didnt marry someone from work then...

@ Blueshark

May find this interesting Simons Simplex Collection Project

Dh is an academic and engineer, but he definitely has no traits of ASD. He isn't even good at his job especially as his systematic thinking is poor as is his maths. He was pushed into it by his mother.

Suffice to say, probably having a child with autism is not genetic at all but symptomatic of having a job in engineering.

I think they should remove all engineer fathers from their jobs and make them into car salesmen and perhaps it will cure our children. Just a though.

totally agree with amber. it's basic common sense that there will be more parents somewhere on the spectrum working in those (less socially involved) areas of expertise, and getting it on and having children. no brainer.

and i would suggest an element of bias in the diagnostic process too. 'high achieving' parents are probably going to subscribe to a more medicalised model and believe strongly in research and dx - the Amish? not so much. less belief in intervention and therefore less dx.

i find the 'come from different areas of the country' thing completely ridiculous.

LeonieDelt

"when will mainstream media figure out that there are autisms, plural?"

The possible answer is when we start to talk about the various issues which can cause so so called traits, or communication problems, and thought patterns, and we begin discussing the various types of different support options each different subtype of autism may require and even more importantly the issues of those who do not quite fit the spectrum, but have some of the underlying issues which still pose their own more limnited types of problems.
It is about seeing the autistic spectrum, as part of the much wider spectrum of issues which all humans can have, and that, many can have a single component or single problem, which when it combines with other components or problems can become one or more of the autisms. So when there is a better understanding of the underlying causes of autism, and we stop relying on observed behavior as a means of diagnosis, as behavior carries the implication of bad behaviour as opposed the the real cognitive and neurological barriers that exist.

So we need to move from traits to specific multiple disabilities, or clinically defined neurological barriers, which is what current research is beginning to unlock and understand.

Come from different continents?

This is just a more sophisticated version of blame the Mum - dared to go to uni and get a good job?

Cue terror propaganda from small-penised "researcher" - Get ye back to the kitchen and don't compete with me for a promotion or you'll have an autistic child!

Has it occurred to him that better educated parents are the ones most likely to overcome the caring carrot parenting course nonsense and actually obtain a diagnosis for higher functioning children? Agree that he only looks at a sub-set of a tiny sliver of a very wide spectrum disorder.

Baron-Cohen is dong a lot of damage in lots of areas with his theories on "empathy". ASD is far too serious a disorder for his brand of pop pyschology. I'll be very angry if I find out the tax payer is funding him when so many asd kids go without therapy and exist in real poverty.

I'm far more interested in the real scientific research in to genes (ya know where they look at dna and stuff?) & the new neuroimaging and urine diagnostic lines of enquiry.

I KNOW my DS's traits are inherited, what I don't know is how to get him the help he needs and be able to go out to work to enable him to have a decent standard of life (boiler broken and no money to fix it - not foreign holidays).

Coming from differing areas of the country might suggest a non genetic cause I suppose, ie linked to immunity or infection or perhaps linked to distance from family support. Personally I suspect there are as many differing hypothesesises (?) as types of autism to yet be discovered.

Oh I'll take part as well if I can.

If you have a severely autistic child and have to complete his bonkers autism quotient questionnaire thingy (might be called something else but it's full of questions like 'does your child prefer the library or parties' my answer 'depends which has the best (according to him) toilets'. Anyway sometimes you have to fill that form in to take part - and it's nonsensical if your child is severely autistic - then email them and they will remove the requirement for it to be completed for that child.

he's just talking about the running-in-the-family spectrummyness isn't he?
hmm, seems like "your great-grandma could have told you this" common sense to me.

nice that you will take part saintly jimjams - surfing finished for the season?

I think in the literature there's now a recognition of those different pathways Leonie (at last). Did you see that paper are immune abnormalities and regressive autism (and the authors made the point it was important to separate out regressive from non-regressive).

On not are (iPad!)

Both myself and dp met at work, software house, I'd say genetics plays a part.

Soon to be ex Dickhead has a first in Maths and is a programmer, I've a Desmond in Physics. We had no chance, did we...

Nope lingle - we were out last Sunday. Big swell ds1 loved it. Hoping his school will shut on the 30th so we can go then - if not we'll go the following weekend :) I will take part if we can but last time I tried e study despite being about 'autism' excluded those with severe autism so we couldn't!

Mango - yes genetics plays a part in some autisms - of the type lougle describes- running in the family spectrumness. But there are other autisms out there and the genetics of that can be far more complicated. Then there's regressive versus non regressive etc etc. Sbc never seems to make that clear (mind you last time I saw him talk which was admittedly a few years ago he said he still believed in one cause - although I wasn't clear whether he meant one sort of brain bit affected (potentially in multiple ways) or one pathway to autism. The second I think would be ridiculous.

Isn't that completely useless research? He's only surveying graduates? Surely that's going to give an artificially high number of people who are successful in one of those areas?

If you're completely ignoring anyone who doesn't have a degree - that's going to affect the results massively?

Or have I got something wrong there?

I think autism is a catch all term for a wide range of traits...

The daily mail link doesn't work

If you try and go through the ARC website you will have to fill in the profiles which are hard with a severely autistic child.

And yes tab, haven't seen the details but that would seem to make it more likely you'll get engineers etc

Well I'd like to complete the research, and although they said ages ago they'd remove the requirement for me to complete ds1's personality tests (which you have to complete before you can take part in projects) they're still there. I have emailed again.

This MUST skew their results. I have tried twice now to take part but have a choice of either making up the personality test results for ds1 or be unable to take part. So I conclude that everyone taking part in their research must be be a) able to talk 'when s/he talks it isn't always easy for others to get a word in edgeways' and can read or listen to stories 'when s/he is reading a story s/he finds it difficult to work out the character's intentions'. A N/A option would be helpful

s/he is not very good at remembering phone numbers

He doesn't have the faintest idea what a phone number is!

Other people frequently tell him what he has said is impolite

Well he can't speak but how about sniffing people

I'd be tempted to just answer those...

when s/he talks it isn't always easy for others to get a word in edgeways' - false (if they're not verbal there's no issue there)

'when s/he is reading a story s/he finds it difficult to work out the character's intentions'. - true, well if you can't read it, you're never going to work out the character's intentions

and so on

It seems a bit pointless anyway, the whole thing I mean - having an engineer as a parent can't possibly cause autism, or changing your job would get rid of it, it's just correlation, which is not useful, mildly interesting maybe, but a bit of a waste of time really.