Walk into any room where an autistic child is playing and you may notice behavior that looks, on the surface, indistinguishable from obsessive compulsive disorder. Objects arranged in precise lines. A rigid insistence that the afternoon schedule follows exactly the same order every day. A repeated action that seems to have no obvious purpose to…
Every April, blue lights appear on landmark buildings, social media feeds fill with colorful ribbons, and organizations around the world release statements of solidarity. For those who know an autistic person or belong to the autistic community, the month can feel simultaneously meaningful and deeply complicated. For those just learning about it, the sheer volume…
Anyone who has watched a dog spin in circles, avoid eye contact, or melt down over a loud noise has probably wondered whether that pet could be autistic. It’s a natural question, especially for people who live with autism themselves or care for someone who does. But can animals have autism in the same clinical…
Autism spectrum disorder looks different in almost every person who has it, which is part of why “high functioning autism” is one of the most searched, and most misunderstood, terms connected to the condition. It’s not an official diagnostic category. You won’t find it in the DSM-5. Yet millions of parents, partners, and adults typing…
Most parents do not go looking for information on autism until something feels a little off. Maybe your baby does not turn toward their name the way a cousin’s baby did, or they seem uninterested in the back-and-forth games that other infants enjoy. Recognizing the early signs and symptoms of autism in infants is not…
If you have recently received an autism diagnosis for yourself or a child, or you are trying to make sense of a report full of clinical language, one question tends to come up right away: how many levels of autism are there? The short answer is three. Since 2013, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of…
Level one autism is the mildest of the three severity levels used in an autism spectrum disorder diagnosis. It describes people who need some support with social communication and flexibility, but who can often speak in full sentences, hold conversations, and manage daily routines with a manageable amount of outside help. Many people know this…
Many parents start searching for an autism test for teens after noticing something shift, maybe their once-easygoing child now seems overwhelmed by school, avoids group activities, or reacts strongly to noise and light that never bothered them before. Teenagers themselves sometimes start the search too, after comparing notes with friends or reading about autism online…
For years, clinicians were not permitted to diagnose ADHD and autism in the same person. If a child met criteria for autism spectrum disorder, any attention or impulsivity issues were usually folded into that diagnosis rather than assessed on their own. That changed with the DSM-5 in 2013, which removed the exclusion rule and allowed…
Autism looks different in almost every person it touches, which is exactly why so many people still search for the “different types of autism” even though the diagnostic manual used across the United States no longer divides autism into separate categories. If you’ve come across terms like Asperger’s syndrome, high-functioning autism, or PDD-NOS and wondered…
End of content
End of content