The Associated Press has a story that says the rise in autism isn't so much that more kids have it, but that it is being diagnosed more often because of the increase in special education funding. And a shifting definition of what autism is.
But many experts believe these unsociable behaviors were just about as common 30 or 40 years ago. The recent explosion of cases appears to be mostly caused by a surge in special education services for autistic children, and by a corresponding shift in what doctors call autism.Autism has always been diagnosed by making judgments about a child's behavior; there are no blood or biologic tests. For decades, the diagnosis was given only to kids with severe language and social impairments and unusual, repetitious behaviors.
... In the 1990s, the autism umbrella expanded, and autism is now shorthand for a group of milder, related conditions, known as "autism spectrum disorders."The spectrum includes Asperger's syndrome and something called PDD-NOS (for Pervasive Developmental Disorder-Not Otherwise Specified). Some support groups report more than half of their families fall into these categories, but there is no commonly accepted scientific breakdown.
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