Thomas Sowell: Real Autism (NOT LATE-TALKING CHILDREN!)

National Review Online ^ | July 16, 2008 | Thomas Sowell

[neverdem]

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July 16, 2008, 0:00 a.m.

Real Autism
Parents need to be spared the emotional trauma of false diagnoses and children need to be spared stressful treatments that follow false diagnoses.

By Thomas Sowell

‘New Ways to Diagnose Autism Earlier” read a recent headline in the Wall Street Journal. There is no question that you can diagnose anything as early as you want. The real question is whether the diagnosis will turn out to be correct.

My own awareness of how easy it is to make false diagnoses of autism grew out of experiences with a group of parents of late-talking children that I formed back in 1993.

A number of those children were diagnosed as autistic. But the passing years have shown most of the diagnoses to have been false, as most of these children have not only begun talking but have developed socially.

Some parents have even said, “Now I wish he would shut up.”

I did absolutely nothing to produce these results. As a layman, I refused to diagnose these children, much less suggest any treatment, even though many parents wanted such advice.

As word of my group spread, various parents would write to ask if they could bring their child to me to seek my impression or advice. I declined every time.

Yet, if I had concocted some half-baked method of diagnosing and treating these children, I could now claim a high rate of success in “curing” autism, based on case studies. Perhaps my success rate would be as high as that claimed by various programs being touted in the media.

If a child is not autistic to begin with, almost anything will “cure” him with the passage of time.

My work brought me into contact with Professor Stephen Camarata of Vanderbilt University, who has specialized in the study of late-talking children — and who is qualified to diagnose autism.

Professor Camarata has organized his own group of parents of late-talking children, which has grown to hundreds, as compared to the several dozen children in my group. Yet the kinds of children and the kinds of families are remarkably similar in the two groups, in ways spelled out in my book The Einstein Syndrome.

The difference is that Professor Camarata is not a layman but a dedicated professional, with decades of experience — and he too has expressed dismay at the number of false diagnoses of autism that he has encountered.

What Camarata has also encountered is something that I encountered in my smaller group— parents who have been told to allow their child to be diagnosed as autistic, in order to become eligible for government money that is available, and can be used for speech therapy or whatever other treatment the child might need.

How much this may have contributed to the soaring statistics on the number of children diagnosed as autistic is something that nobody knows — and apparently not many people are talking about it.



Another factor in the great increase in the number of children diagnosed as autistic is a growing practice of referring to children as being on “the autistic spectrum.”

In other words, a child may not actually be autistic but has a number of characteristics common among autistic children. The problem with this approach is that lots of children who are not autistic have characteristics that are common among autistic children.

For example, a study of high-IQ children by Professor Ellen Winner of Boston College found these children to have “obsessive interests” and “often play alone and enjoy solitude,” as well as being children who “seem to march to their own drummer” and have “prodigious memories.” Many of the children in my group and in Professor Camarata’s group have these characteristics.

Those who diagnose children by running down a checklist of “symptoms” can find many apparently “autistic” children or children on “the autism spectrum.”

Parents need to be spared the emotional trauma of false diagnoses and children need to be spared stressful treatments that follow false diagnoses. Yet the “autism spectrum” concept provides lots of wiggle room for those who are making false diagnoses.

Real autism may not get as much money as it needs if much of that money is dissipated on children who are not in fact autistic. But money is money to those who are running research projects— and a gullible media helps them get that money.

— Thomas Sowell is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University.

© 2008 CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC.
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COPYRIGHT 2007 CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC.

[07Jack]

I don’t think Sowell is trying to “minimize autism.”
Please check out Sowell’s books: “The Einstein Syndrome” and “Late Talking Children”. Sowell does not paint with a broad brush and has come up with some very specific criteria for parents to consider when deciding a course of action that could potentially cause more harm than good.
Our son did not speak until until he was 5. Our Pediatrician, after many examinations expressed the opinion he was simply a late talking child who fell at the extreme end of the speech bell curve.
We were lucky enough to stumble upon Sowell’s book, and found that our child met the description of the children in his book. We were able to avoid attempts by the school district to label him as autistic in order to receive public funding for “special services.” Our son is now 9 and after 4 years of speech therapy, speaks very well, does extremely well socially and is an A student.

[Scotswife]

my Stephen “marches to his own drummer” - but has excellent memory, and academically does quite well.

They suspect CAPD because testing shows he is getting his information through visual cues, rather than verbal instruction.
If the kid is told, verbally, something - he misses the point.
When he is shown visually what the concept is - he nails it.

He is large for his age (looks 3-4 yrs. older than he is), but emotionally immature for his age.

I think this puts him in an awkward position socially.

[commonguymd]

I learned in college that 90 percent of people respond much better to visual cues than auditory cues and learn visually. It is rare for someone to be prone to auditory learning over visual learning. An example of this is the written word creates facts curiously faster than if someone hears word of mouth.

Basically that is very very normal. Myself included, I am much more of a visual learner.

[grellis]

She is afraid of becoming a glorified babysitter of bad parents' children.

I felt it needed that extra word.

Kids obsessed with dinosaurs, trains, horses? Kids who like to play alone? Childhood has become a disease, apparently.

[commonguymd]

Thanks. I guess it even boils down to children in her mind that get very little learning stimulus at home or don’t have parents willing to control and command. I can appreciate the correction.

[commonguymd]

Btw, as another point in business seminars they really rail on the use of visual cues for just that point. People respond, remember, react, and learn more from visual stimuli and verbal cues don’t work to teach as well. That is why you can only remember 10-20 percent of a speech in class if you are lucky, and learn more from reading the chapter. That is why one takes notes during lectures. You remember it in pixels and on paper much better.

Normal normal normal.

[neverdem]

Although he's an economist by training, Dr. Sowell brings some badly needed common sense to the discussion. Here's the first thread with a slightly different title:

Autism Cures? (Thomas Sowell)

IMHO, late talking children could use another thread.

Regardless of whether it is called Autism, Autistic Disorder, Autistic Spectrum Disorder or Autism Spectrum Disorder, basing a diagnosis on an assortment of behaviors in the latest version of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual IV-TR, just leaves me uncomfortable because it is such a vague diagnostic term when specific genetic characteristics have been identified for at least some patients:

Autism Cause: Brain Development Genes?

In other words, without a more specific diagnosis, most drug and behavioral treatments strike me as just shots in the dark. Likewise, just describing abnormal childhood development doesn't mean that there is an effective treatment. "First, do no harm."

Pathologists Believe They Have Pinpointed Achilles Heel Of HIV

Nisshinbo creates platinum-free carbon catalyst for fuel cells.

FReepmail me if you want on or off my health and science ping list.

[grellis]

I felt I had to add it because of what I see every day. Very few of the kids in my neighborhood aren't on some kind of medication for one or more of these various "disorders" and "syndromes." They are, with only one exception I've seen so far, the most normal bunch of kids you can imagine, given their circumstances at home. Most of them are being raised by Grandma, who isn't really interested in raising them, because she already raised her own. Few of them know their fathers, fewer still ever see their fathers. These kids are basically raising themselves, with the help of Cartoon Network and XBox. Of course they are basket cases, when compared to kids being raised in a traditional households. That's not a medical problem, though, and it shouldn't be treated pharmacologically.

There is one boy in our 'hood who clearly exhibits behavior way out of the childhood norm. He's eight or nine, has an extraordinary vocabulary, but it is nearly impossible to talk to him. His mind changes directions after two sentences. Socially, he acts several years younger than he is--almost like a toddler. He has a very nice family, both parents in the home, both very involved. His siblings are just regular kids, but very protective of him.

[DFG]

My daughter did not talk much until she was almost four. Our daughter started reading before she was 3 but did not verbalize much. My wife was very concerned about it so I gave in and agreed to have her evaluated for early childhood intervention. We were first time parents. What did we know.

This “evaluation” was done by 3 elementary school teachers. They took our daughter into a room filled with toys (without us) and attempted to interact with her. Our daughter turned her back on the teachers and played with the toys. The teachers came out of the room and told us very sternly that our daughter is in the autistic spectrum and needs help. So we sent her to early preschool and for about 2 months had a speech therapist come to our house.

I then started educating myself on the subject of late talking children. I read Thomas Sowell’s 2 books on the subject.

Around 4 years of age, a light bulb went on in our daughter’s brain and she started talking a lot more.
She was tested for the gifted program in the 1st grade and aced it.

She is now 10 years old and gets straight A’s. She loves to read and write short stories. In the 1st grade, she became interested in dinosaurs and read everything she could find about the subject. Now she is obsessed with reading about greek mythology.

“Special ed” is a huge scam. School districts get federal money for each “special ed” student so they are quick pin a label on a kid for being a little different.

[Scotswife]

his problem seems to go beyond what is normal.

It was enough to interfere with normal development.

He confuses certain sounds and “hears” things differently.

They call it dyslexia of the ears.

We will know more when he gets tested by a pediatric audiologist who specializes in the disorder, but they advised us to wait until he was 7 (just turned 7, and it takes around 6 months to get an appt.)

He didn’t do well in a regular audiologist test because he couldn’t understand directions well enough to complete the test.

[Grampa Dave]

Our grand daughter was a late talker and really late when compared to the early talkers in her neighborhood and the baby group, set up by the hospital re birthdates. Now she more than holds her own with the original group, her neighborhood and classmates.

We kept telling her parents to relax. When she stayed with her Grandmother and I, she talked because we listened and didn’t interupt nor hurry her. If she didn’t want to talk, we didn’t force her to talk.

Sometime during her pre school time, she started talking and hasn’t stopped yet. Since then, every year, she has been the best reader in her class, not the fastest, but the best re understanding what she reads and being able to remember and discuss it.

She has excellent verbal skills and can tell anyone what she has read, hears or a combination of the two. She may be the best listener in the family, and we have a couple of excellent ones. She is a creative writer and also able to compose material based on data or what she has read.

[Myrddin]

I’m amazed he didn’t mention Asperger’s in his article.

ComputerWorld had an article about the "dark secret in IT". It was about the large number of IT employees with Asperger's. Sometimes it is an asset.

[Dianna]

School districts get federal money for each “special ed” student so they are quick pin a label on a kid for being a little different.

No, they don't. There IS a limit, and the money spent by districts on special ed students FAR, FAR outstrips anything they receive from the Fed.

[Born Conservative]

I have a nephew whose second grade parochial school teacher diagnosed him as autistic

Good for your sister. A TEACHER has absolutely NO BUSINESS diagnosing autism. That, by law, is left for a physician to do.

[lkco]

They call it dyslexia of the ears.

Our son was diagnosed with verbal, auditory and visual dyslexia at 6. It took a whole lot of hard work and one-on-one attention from us (the therapist gave us the references and we did it ourselves).

He's almost 14 and still has a few issues ... when he's tired he garbles his speech a bit, and his handwriting is finally becoming somewhat legible. He's at a college reading level and a college math level. He has great friends and a 4.0. He's first trumpet it two bands and plays 4 sports. Everything "comes easy" to him now.

It was like pushing a train up a mountain ... so much hard and aggravating work at the beginning ... now it's all downhill ... like a runaway train down the mountain. Keep positive ... you'll get through it.

[Scotswife]

thanks for the positive input!

it looks like we’ve been spared visual dyslexia.
The hurdles are moments where he really needs to understand the spoken word, and he is also emotionally immature - socially awkward.
A kind and gentle giant - but difficult to play easily with other children his age.

[Scotswife]

” Sometimes it is an asset.”

yes...google “brain man”. He’s a good example.

One neurologist I met must fit into this category.
Worst social mutant I’ve ever encountered.

[Scotswife]

“uses sign language.”

Check into central auditory processing disorder.
Symptoms are similar - but come from very different sources.

Pediatric audiologist ought to help you with that possibility.

[Scotswife]

“second grade parochial school teacher diagnosed him as autistic “

There is nothing in the background of an elementary school teacher that qualifies them to make any sort of medical diagnosis.

Sure - they may wind up working with autistic kids, and one child’s symptoms may remind them of another - but the symptoms could be caused by something else.

They can pull a parent aside and say “this is how Jonny has been behaving in class and I recommend you have him evaluated by a physician...”

But they cannot say “Johnny is autistic”
No way, no how.

[TChris]

Thomas Sowell is a jewel. We are blessed to have him.