Your knowledge and understanding of disability will depend on many factors, including your personal and professional experience. The purpose of this unit is to raise awareness of autism: what is meant by the term, how it can affect people’s lives and what you need to know or find out in order to support the learning of pupils with autism.
Over the years, many different diagnostic labels have been used, such as autism, autism spectrum disorder (ASD), autism spectrum condition (ASC), Asperger syndrome and Pathological Demand Avoidance (PDA). Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is now one of the most common terms.
Whatever label is used, it is generally accepted that an ASD is characterised by the ‘triad of impairments’ described by Wing and Gould. [Wing, L. and Gould, J. (1979) 'Severe impairments of social interaction and associated abnormalities in children: Epidemiology and classification.' Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 9:11–29.]
- social interaction
- communication
- imagination (flexibility of thought and behaviour).
ASD is a lifelong developmental disability that affects how people perceive the world and interact with others.
Activity
Start by watching this short film from the National Autistic Society. What is autism? contains a lot of useful information. As you watch the film, use your notepad to note any points that you think might be important when thinking about how best to address the needs of pupils with ASD.
Now read the notes that accompany the film which also supply useful details about ASD.
Key points
Although everyone will have their own ideas about what is important, it’s likely that, when you were watching the film, you noted some of the following key points.
- It’s very common. More than 1 in 100 people in the UK are on the autism spectrum.
- It’s a hidden disability – you can’t tell someone is on the autism spectrum from what you see.
- ASD affects communication, relating to other people and perceptions of the world.
- Being a spectrum condition means that, although there are common characteristics, it affects individuals in different ways.
- Asperger syndrome is a type of ASD. People with Asperger syndrome often have above average intelligence but can, nevertheless, experience difficulties in processing language.
- Some common characteristics of ASD are love of routine, sensory issues (e.g. sensitivity to noise or smells), special interests and difficulties with social life (e.g. because it’s hard to read facial expressions and to interpret non-literal language).
The film doesn’t make any distinction between females and males. However, it’s a fact that more boys and men are diagnosed with ASD than girls and women.
A number of explanations have been suggested including:
- research and diagnostic tools have focused on males
- ASD manifests itself differently in males and females because of inherent or socially and culturally related differences between the sexes.
Given your role in supporting pupils with ASD, the important thing to remember is that it affects female as well as male pupils, even though it may often look rather different in girls and in boys. For example, girls may often be more able to follow social actions by delayed imitation and are more aware of social interactions. However, despite the cultural norms that girls are social in their communication, girls with ASD are unlikely to do ‘chit chat’ or make ‘meaningless’ comments to facilitate communication. As a result, these pupils may experience social isolation, lowered grades and confusion. It is likely that large numbers of undiagnosed girls are going through the education system.