conuly: "I'm not a puzzle, I'm a person" (puzzle)
conuly ([personal profile] conuly) wrote2011-01-10 02:55 am
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Ugh.

Well, apparently closely-spaced second-born children are more likely to be on the spectrum than first-borns or those spaced further apart.

The comments are a morass of "FOOD COLORING! DOES ANYBODY REALLY KNOW ANY GRANDPAS WITH AUTISM???" (Hi, I do!) and "TV WATCHING! THAT STUDY WAS SOOOOOO WELL DONE!" (No, it wasn't!) and "OMG, VACCINATIONS, BIG CONSPIRACY!!! (Uh-huh, you keep saying that!) but this one takes the cake:

There was study conducted to understand the risk of autism based on genealogy. The researcher chose to examined Amish people since they live in a closed society. In case you didn't know, roughly 65% of Amish have the same surname. When they first came over, their were about 300 families. Since their lifestyle isn't that appealing they rarely get new blood. They try not to get closer than 3rd cousins, but still they all pretty close. This of course increases the chance of defects greatly. So reason dictates they would have a greater percentage of autistic children.

S/he goes on from there with the same-old, same-old "Oh, the Amish don't vaccinate and they don't have autism and it's so not a coincidence!" line.

To all this, I can only say the following:

A. Logic doesn't work like that.
B. Genetics doesn't work like that.
C. YOUR PREMISES ARE ALL WRONG! Why do people have this asinine idea that the Amish don't vaccinate, or that they don't have any autism? It's not because they bothered to look up the facts for themselves - you'll notice this person has no idea what study or researcher they're talking about. No, they just repeat the same old tired lines that were worn out the first day anybody ever said them. (And they weren't true then either.)

Oh, and she also goes "As you may know, Autism was unheard of prior to 1900 (right around vaccines were widely introduced). Though many would simply say that it existed but people were simply unable to spot it back then, riiiight. "

That doesn't even merit a response. I mean, I have a few (and they're longer than two words!), but she doesn't deserve the energy.

[identity profile] leora.livejournal.com 2011-01-10 06:52 pm (UTC)(link)
Well, it definitely runs in families, so there is clearly a strong genetic component. But it doesn't seem 100% genetic to me. Multiple environmental triggers is certainly possible. And if you're just leaving "environment" open, then it could either be prenatal or postnatal. But it really can't go too far into postnatal, because it really does seem to get set pretty early. You don't hear about adults or even older children developing autism with no earlier signs. Sure, you hear about later diagnoses, but generally then you also hear about earlier symptoms that weren't put together.

And I don't think that's misdiagnosing. I don't think this is the sort of thing people can develop too far into brain development.

But yes, definitely a strong genetic component, since autistic children often have a parent on the spectrum or at least one who recognizes several of those symptoms in themselves.