People With Autism Are Different from One Another If you've seen Rainman or a TV show about autism, you may think you know what autism “looks like.” In fact, though, when you've met one person with with autism you've met ONE person with autism. Some people with autism are chatty; others are silent.
Children with autism spectrum disorder often become overly interested in a single object or subject and devote all their time and attention to it. They tend to learn everything they can about that one topic and talk about it constantly, sometimes sounding like a junior expert. Unusual speech.
Most autistic children develop special interests and may love talking about them. Special interests often have a purpose and therefore should be treated with respect. It is not easy to teach autistic children to talk less and listen more.
People with autism often speak with a different rhythm, prosody, and/or volume than typical peers. Thus, even if the words themselves are appropriate, they may sound flat, loud, soft, or otherwise different. It's not unusual for people with autism to "script" their conversations.
A person with autism: Might not realize a certain topic will trigger certain emotions in others; turn people off. May experience significant discomfort making eye contact. Might ramble and have trouble getting to the point.
We autistic people can't always control our voices so we can speak too loudly or softly and use incorrect pitch tone and speed. Talking normally can require a lot of conscious effort.
One particularly rich indicator of social differences in autism is the voice. Children with autism often sound different from other people. Some may speak in a flat, monotone voice; others may use unusual modulation or stress different words or parts of words in their speech; and some may speak at an increased volume.
Lots of autistic people find using the phone unpleasant, but most of the solutions I've read focus on the social complexities and anxiety of initiating conversations with people you don't know.
A recent study of nearly 100 children with autism and 100 typically developing peers conducted by Joshua Diehl, Notre Dame assistant professor of psychology, and colleagues at Yale and Harvard universities suggests the speech difficulty may be because children with autism understand meaning differently as it's ...
The popular image of a person with autism is a quiet, isolated individual who prefers solitude to social interaction. This is often true, but by no means always the case. While autistic people, by definition, have challenges with social communication, many enjoy social interaction, group activities, and friendships.
Some people on the autism spectrum may seek social opportunities and may initiate social interactions themselves, others may enjoy social situations and interactions when they are initiated effectively by others.
Signs of High-Functioning Autism in Children
May appear more mature for their age and have above-average intelligence. A tendency to avoid eye contact. Trouble deviating from a routine or adapting to changes. Trouble making friends and maintaining social relationships or not “fitting in” with peers.
A child with level 1 autism may understand and speak in complete sentences, but have difficulty engaging in back-and-forth conversation. Children with ASD level 1 experience some inflexibility of behavior, like difficulty switching between tasks, staying organized, and planning.
Autism Symptoms in Adults
Adults on the spectrum commonly exhibit symptoms related to social and communication difficulties, repetitive behaviors, sensory processing difficulties, and issues with executive function and theory of mind.
Repetitive and restricted behaviors (RRBs) are common symptoms of autism. 1 Repetitive behaviors might include repetitively rocking the body, opening and closing drawers, or talking about the same thing continuously.
Autism can cause a person to miss many social cues such as facial expressions and verbal signals that are commonly used while interacting. If a person with autism says something that appears rude or offensive, it is most likely a result of missing or not being able to read typical social cues.
Cluttering. There is another language problem found in autism that can produce fast, unclear conversation. Cluttering is when someone talks rapidly, with syllables that run together, excessive filler words and repetitions, and abnormal pauses. It often occurs alongside stuttering, though it's less well-known.
While kids with ASD [High-Functioning Autism] may have begun talking at an appropriate age, they often used a rather long-winded (and sometimes rather concrete or literal) style of speaking. Pedantic describes speech that is overly-focused on the details of its topic.
A new study from Leiden University in the Netherlands finds that people with ASD prefer computer-mediated communication—talking to people via email, instant message, or text. For the study, the researchers evaluated 113 adults with ASD and 72 adults without ASD.
A common feature of autism spectrum disorder, ASD, is reduced eye contact with others in natural conditions.
Phone calls can be more intense. Many find silence less comfortable on the phone. There is no normal environmental distractions which may provide a few moments relief. If there are distractions, the other person can't see or hear them, so we have to focus even harder.
Many minimally verbal children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) develop idiosyncratic communication habits and ways of expressing themselves. It is difficult to say why your son developed this new habit of only whispering or mouthing words.
Sounds in words run together and sounds or syllables may be deleted. For example, “It's like this” may sound like, “slikethi.” pauses in places where they would not be expected grammatically.