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Autism spectrum disorders news

Autism spectrum disorders

Why some autistic people don't speak

Around a third of autistic people—children and adults alike—are unable to share what they want using speech.

Autism spectrum disorders

Survey shows only 36% of neurologists identify motor deficits as part of autism diagnosis

A new UCLA Health study highlights concerning gaps in how child neurologists understand and address motor difficulties in children with autism, despite research showing these movement problems affect the majority of autistic ...

Medications

Five things to know about folinic acid and autism

As the Food and Drug Administration moves to make folinic acid an official treatment for a neurological condition associated with autism, parents want to know how it might help children with autism spectrum disorder.

Health

RFK Jr pushes fringe claim linking autism to circumcision

US President Donald Trump and his Health Secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., on Thursday promoted another fringe theory about autism—this time linking it to circumcision or to pain medication given for the procedure.

Medications

Q&A: Autism and Tylenol

The federal administration offered health guidance at a press conference this week, urging pregnant women to avoid using the over-the-counter painkiller acetaminophen, marketed in the U.S. as Tylenol, saying use of the medication ...

Psychology & Psychiatry

Identity distress fuels mental health issues in autism

A new study from the Department of Psychology at Durham University has found that identity distress (difficulty forming a cohesive identity) could be behind the higher rates of poor mental health experienced by autistic people.

Autism spectrum disorders

What research really says about autism

About two to three percent of all Americans—including adults and children—are autistic. With recent reports that autism rates are rising, potentially due to improved diagnosis, there's a lot of conflicting information ...

Genetics

New findings expand genetic knowledge of autism underpinnings

Hundreds of novel genetic variants across an ancestrally diverse cohort of 195 families, including 222 people with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), have been identified by researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center, expanding ...

Psychology & Psychiatry

Autism diagnoses rising among U.S. children, adults

Big surges in new autism diagnoses among young adults, as well a rise in diagnoses for girls and young women, have driven a near-tripling of U.S. autism cases in just over a decade, researchers report.

Neuroscience

How the brain plans ahead to predict the world

Your brain not only processes what you see but continuously makes predictions based on your experiences. This process may be less finetuned in people with autism.

Neuroscience

Brain organoids reveal autism biology and potential treatments

Using stem cells generated from patients with a rare and severe form of autism spectrum disorder and intellectual disability, Scripps Research scientists have grown personalized "mini-brains" (or organoids) to study the disorder ...

Genetics

Increased autism risk linked to Y chromosome, study finds

Increased risk for autism appears to be linked to the Y chromosome, a Geisinger Health System study has found, offering a new explanation for the greater prevalence of autism in males. The results are published in Nature ...