Autism Symptoms

Autism symptoms are a combination of causes and factors leading to various changes in the human body, more often in childhood, which may indicate the onset and development of this disease. Autism and autistic disorders is a disease that is a form of mental disorder in which children have significant developmental disorders, expressed in a distorted perception of reality and the denial of social interaction. How to identify autism, what is it expressed in, what criteria may indicate the onset of the disease? The answers to these and many other questions can be found by reading the following article.

Onset of manifestation of the disease and classification

Such a disease in children occurs in two to four cases per hundred thousand people. If we add to this the hidden atypical autism, when the underlying disease is accompanied by mental retardation, then this number will immediately increase to twenty. Autism is four times more common in boys than in girls.

Autistic disorder can manifest itself in anyone at any age, but the clinical signs of the disease will vary significantly in children, adolescents and adults.

It is customary to distinguish between: early childhood autism (RAA), which can be detected in babies under the age of three, childhood autism, which manifests itself from three to eleven years old, and adolescent autism, which is usually detected in people after eleven years of age.

There are several types of this disease. They have different symptoms and some specific features characteristic of a particular type of disease. According to the international classification of diseases, there are: Kanner’s syndrome or classic autism, Asperger’s syndrome, Rett’s syndrome and atypical autism.

The manifestation of the first signs of childhood autism can be seen already in a one-year-old child. Although more pronounced symptoms of the disease appear, as a rule, in two and a half to three years. During this period, the child’s isolation, withdrawal into himself and the limitedness of his interests are most noticeable.

If such a child is not the first in the family, then the mother sees the initial signs of the disease in infancy, since a comparison can be made between this baby and his older brother or sister. Otherwise, it is quite difficult to understand that something is wrong with the child. Usually, this manifests itself at the moment when the autistic child goes to kindergarten, that is, much later.

It happens that the diagnosis of autism is made after the age of five. These children are characterized by:

• the presence of a higher IQ, compared with those patients in whom the disease was diagnosed earlier;
• maintaining communication skills;
• the presence of less pronounced cognitive disorders;
• distorted perception of the world around;
• behavior in which there is a sense of isolation from society.

Almost always, there is a certain period of time between the first signs of autism and the immediate diagnosis. After all, later, when the child has a need to communicate not only with relatives and friends, other character traits arise that parents did not attach importance to at all before. In other words, the disease does not come on suddenly, but it is rather difficult to recognize it at the initial stage.

The main signs for the diagnosis of autism

Although the symptoms of the disease vary significantly depending on the form of autism, the age of the child and other factors, there are basic signs of the disease that are common to all autistic people. It should be understood that the presence of one of the symptoms is not enough to make such a diagnosis. In such cases, the so-called triad is used for diagnosis – the three most obvious signs by which the presence of this disease can be determined. Let’s consider each of the main features in more detail.

social relationship

This characteristic is essential for children with autism. Autistic people shun the external environment, locking themselves in their own fantasy world. They do not like to communicate and in every possible way avoid various communications.

The fact that the baby does not ask for hands at all, is inactive, reacts poorly to new toys, does not clap, rarely smiles, does not look into the eyes when communicating with him, should alert the mother. Sick children, as a rule, do not respond to their own name, react poorly to sounds and light. When you try to establish communication with them, they get scared or become aggressive. Lack of eye contact is characteristic of more severe forms of autism and this symptom is not manifested in all patients. Often such children can look at one point for a long time, as if through a person.

Growing up, the child increasingly withdraws into himself, almost never asks for help, has little contact with other family members. Many of the sick do not tolerate hugs and touches.

Speech and perception

Verbal communication disorders always occur in autism. In some they may be pronounced, in others they may be weak. In this case, both a speech delay and a complete absence of speech function can be observed.

This is more evident in early childhood autism. In young children, speech may even be completely absent. In some cases, on the contrary: the child begins to speak, and after a while closes in himself and falls silent. It happens that such children are initially ahead of their peers in speech development, and then, from about a year and a half, there is a regressive decline, and they stop speaking altogether. However, they often talk to themselves, and sometimes in their sleep.

Also, babies often lack babbling and cooing, various gestures and facial expressions are rarely used. Growing up, the child begins to speak tongue-tied, confuses pronouns. Speaking about themselves, they usually use the third person address: “he wants to eat”, “Andrey wants to eat”, and so on.

Being around other people, such children are usually silent, not inclined to communicate and may not answer questions. However, when left alone, they often comment on their actions, talk to themselves, and even recite poetry.

The speech of such children is characterized by monotony, lack of intonation. It is dominated by quotes, various commands, strange words, rhymes.

Speech delay is a common reason for parents to visit a speech therapist or defectologist. The specialist can determine what exactly caused the violation of speech function. In autism, this is due to the unwillingness to communicate, communicate with anyone, deny interactions with the outside world. The delay in speech development in such cases indicates serious violations in the social sphere.

Limited interests

Autistic children most often show interest in any one toy and it persists for many years. The games of such children are monotonous, or they do not play in principle. Often you can see how a child watches the movement of a sunbeam for hours or watches the same cartoon several times. They can be so absorbed in one occupation that they give the impression of complete detachment from the outside world, and attempts to tear them away from this end in bouts of tantrum.

Children with autism most often do not play with their toys, but rather tend to arrange them in a certain order and constantly sort them by shape, size or color.

The interests of autistics are reduced to the constant recounting and sorting of objects, as well as lining them up in a certain order. Sometimes they are fond of collecting, designing. Any of the interests that are found in autistic people is characterized by a lack of social relationships. Autistic people lead a closed, atypical for their peers, lifestyle, and do not allow anyone into their games, even the same sick children as themselves.

Often they are attracted not by the game itself, but by certain algorithms that take place in them. It is common for such children to periodically turn the tap on and off, looking at the running water and perform other similar actions.

Features of movements

Children with autism can often be recognized by their specific gait and movements. They often swing their arms and stand on their toes when walking. Many people prefer to jump around. Autistic children are characterized by awkwardness, clumsiness in movements. And when running, they often wave their arms uncontrollably and take too big steps.

Often, such patients can be observed walking along a strictly defined route, rocking from side to side while walking, as well as marching with a side step.

stereotypes

Stereotypes, stims, or repetitive actions are characteristic of almost all children suffering from this disease. They usually manifest themselves in speech and behavior. The most common are motor stereotypes, which look like: clenching, unclenching fingers into a fist, twitching shoulders, repetitive head turns, rocking from side to side, running in circles, and so on. Sometimes you can observe how a child is constantly swinging the door, pouring sand or cereals, monotonously flipping a switch, tearing or crumpling paper. All this also applies to stereotypes in autism.

Speech stereotypes are called echolalia. At the same time, children can constantly repeat the same sounds, syllables, words, and even individual phrases. Usually, these are phrases heard from parents or extracted from a favorite cartoon. It is also characteristic that children say phrases completely unconsciously and without putting any meaning into them.

You can also highlight stims in clothes, food, walks. Children tend to form certain rituals: walk along a certain route, the same road, do not step on cracks in the pavement, wear the same clothes, eat the same food. They tend to tap out a certain rhythm, swing in a chair to a certain beat, turn pages in a book back and forth without much interest.

Why exactly stereotypies occur in autism there is no clear answer. Some believe that constantly repeated actions stimulate the nervous system, while others, on the contrary, suggest that the child calms down in this way. The presence of incentives in such a disease allows a person to isolate himself from the outside world.

Intellect disorder

A frequent symptom in autism, manifested in seventy-five percent of patients, is a disorder of intellectual abilities. This may begin with a delay in intellectual development and eventually lead to mental retardation. Usually this condition represents various degrees of retardation in the development of the brain. It is difficult for such a child to concentrate his attention, to concentrate on something. Often there is a rapid loss of interest, the inability to apply generally accepted generalizations and associations.

In some cases, with autistic disorders, the child shows interest in certain activities, and therefore only separate intellectual abilities are formed.

Mild and moderate degree of mental retardation in autism is observed in more than half of patients. In a third of patients, the IQ rarely exceeds seventy. But you should know that usually this condition does not progress, and rarely reaches complete dementia. Children with high IQs often have out-of-the-box thinking that sets them apart from other children and is often the reason for their limited social interaction. It should also be noted that the lower the level of mental abilities of the child, the harder it is for them to adapt in the social sphere.

Nevertheless, such children are more prone to self-learning than others. Many of them themselves learn to read, master simple mathematical abilities. Some retain musical skills, mathematical and mechanical skills for a long time.

Usually, mental disorders are of a periodic nature: there are periods of improvement and deterioration, the occurrence of which can be provoked by various factors: stressful conditions, anxiety, interference in the closed world of an autist.

Emotional disorders

Emotional disturbances in autism include sudden outbursts of aggression, self-aggression, unmotivated anger or fear. Most often, such conditions occur suddenly and do not have any obvious causes. Such children are prone to hyperactivity, or vice versa, are closed, inhibited and confused. These children are prone to self-harm. Often their aggressive behavior is self-directed and is manifested by biting, hair pulling, scratching and other forms of self-torture. These children have practically no pain, or the reaction to pain is atypical.

Clinical manifestations of forms of autism

Each form of autism also has its own specific signs and symptoms. Let’s take a closer look at the most common of them.

Kanner syndrome or infantile form of autism

This category includes childhood, infantile autism and other autistic disorders manifested in children from one to three years of age.

They are characterized by the following features:

• lack of interest in relationships with other people, starting at an early age;
• stereotyping in games;
• fear of any changes in everyday life and in the surrounding space;
• developmental delay;
• lack of speech function for communication with others;
• the appearance of speech stereotypes;
• ignoring pain and other external stimuli.

Asperger’s Syndrome

Asperger’s Syndrome or High Functioning Autism is similar to Kanner’s Syndrome in many ways. However, with this form of the disease, there are no disturbances in speech development and cognitive abilities are highly developed.

With this form of mild autism, children have well-developed thought processes, there is a distorted perception of the surrounding reality and oneself, and there is difficulty in concentrating. Other psychological and physiological symptoms of this disease are as follows:

• stereotypical behavior and limited interests;
• impulsive behavior;
• attachment to the familiar environment;
• violations in communication skills;
• detachment of the gaze, or its aspiration to one point.

Atypical form

The atypical form of autism is characterized by manifestation at a later age. It also occurs in adults, especially in the presence of mental retardation and other developmental diseases. Signs of this form of the disease include:

• emergence and development after three years;
• serious deviations in social interaction between the patient and the people around him;
• limited and stereotyped behavior that occurs with a certain frequency.

Manifestations of autism in newborns

Infants and newborns have significantly pronounced external signs that indicate the presence of a disease: the absence of a smile, vivid emotions, activity inherent in other children of their age, facial expressions and many gestures. The gaze of the baby is often directed to the same point or to any specific object.

Such children practically do not ask for hands and do not copy the emotions of adults. In infants with autism, crying is practically absent, it does not create problems for parents, it is able to occupy itself for hours on its own, without showing any interest in the world around it. The kid does not coo, does not babble, does not respond to his own name. Such children are characterized by some developmental delay: they begin to sit and walk late, there is a retardation in height and weight.

Such children often refuse breastfeeding and do not accept the touch of their father or mother.

Symptoms in toddlers and school-aged children

Patients of younger and school age are characterized by a lack of emotions and isolation. At about one and a half to two years old, such children may completely lack speech function, there is an unwillingness to make eye contact. Often speech disorders at this time are due to the unwillingness to communicate in society. When patients do begin to speak, they face certain difficulties. They often talk about themselves in the third person, confuse pronouns, repeat the same words, sounds and phrases. Often such children have vocalizations, as one of the varieties of stereotypes.

Often, autistic people are hyperactive, but their movements are monotonous and repetitive. Also, such children practically do not cry, even when they hit hard. They avoid the society of their peers, in kindergartens or schools, as a rule, they sit alone. Sometimes they have bouts of aggression or auto-aggression.

The child may not pay attention to the whole subject as a whole, but some of its elements attract him. For example, he can fixate on the wheels or steering wheel of a car, constantly rotating them in his hands. Toys are not of interest to an autistic person as such, but they are very fond of sorting them and laying them out in a certain order.

Such children are very selective in food or clothing. They have many different fears: fear of the dark, various noises. As the disease progresses, possible fears worsen. They are afraid to leave the house, and in especially severe cases, leave their room altogether and remain alone. They are frightened by any change of scenery, and being out of place, they often throw tantrums.

School-age autistic children may attend mainstream or specialized schools. In such children, there is a passion for any one of the subjects. Most often it is drawing, music or mathematics. Autistic adolescents are dominated by significant absent-mindedness, and they also experience significant reading difficulties.

Some autistic people have savant syndrome, characterized by incredible abilities in any particular discipline. They may differ in talents in the musical field or the visual arts, and also have a phenomenal memory.

Children with a low IQ tend to withdraw into themselves and withdraw into their own imaginary world. These children often have speech and social impairments. The kid tries to resort to speech only in very exceptional cases. They never complain and try not to ask for anything, trying in every possible way to avoid any communication.

At this age, children often develop serious deviations in eating behavior, up to a complete refusal of food, which often leads to diseases of the gastrointestinal tract. Eating is reduced to certain rituals, food is chosen in a certain color or shape. The taste criteria of food are not taken into account.

With timely diagnosis of the disease and qualified treatment, autistic children can live a completely normal life, attend secondary schools, and master professional skills. The best success is achieved by autistic people, whose speech and intellectual impairments are minimized.

Signs of autism in adolescence

Most autistic teens experience significant behavioral changes. They acquire new skills, but communication with peers causes them certain difficulties. Puberty is especially difficult for these children. Autistic people in adolescence are most prone to depression, the development of various fears, phobias and panic conditions. They also often have epileptic seizures.

Autism in adults

Adult men and women with autism can most often live and work independently. This directly depends on their intellectual abilities and social activity. About thirty-three percent of such people achieve partial independence.

The same adults, whose intelligence is reduced, or communication is minimized, require quite a lot of attention. They cannot be without any guardianship, which greatly complicates their life and the life of their relatives.

People with an average level of intelligence or with an IQ above average often achieve significant success in the professional field and may well live a full life: get married, start a family. However, not many people succeed in this, as they have significant difficulties in relationships with the opposite sex.

Signs in the fetus during pregnancy

It is possible to recognize the presence of autism in the fetus even during pregnancy. This can be seen in the second trimester during an ultrasound examination. Scientists have proven that the intensive growth of the fetal body and brain at the beginning of the second trimester makes it possible to assume that the child will be born with autism.

The reason for such intensive growth may be the presence of serious infectious diseases in women: measles, chicken pox, rubella. Especially if the expectant mother suffered them in the second trimester, when the child’s brain is being formed.

The difference between autism and dementia

Autism is often confused with other similar diseases, such as dementia. Indeed, the symptoms of such diseases are quite similar. However, children with dementia differ from children with autism:

• rich emotionality;
• abstract thinking;
• large vocabulary.

Such symptoms are not characteristic of autism, but with such a disease, mental retardation can also be observed in patients with this disease.

The myth of vaccination

There is an opinion that autism in a child develops after vaccination of young children. However, this theory has absolutely no evidence base. Many scientific studies have been conducted, and none of them have found a link between vaccination and the occurrence of the disease.

It may happen that the time when the child was vaccinated simply coincided with the moment when the parents noticed the first signs of autism. But not more. The misconception in this matter has led to a sharp decrease in the level of vaccination of the population, and as a result to outbreaks of infectious diseases, in particular, measles.

Testing a child at home

To identify the presence of autism in a child at home, you can use various tests. At the same time, you should be aware that the test results alone are not enough to make a diagnosis, but this will be an extra reason to contact a specialist. There are many tests designed for children of a certain age:

• testing of the child on general indicators of development, intended for children under the age of sixteen months;
• M-CHAT test or modified autism screening test, for children sixteen to thirty months old;
• The CARS Autism Rating Scale is used to test children between the ages of two and four;
• The ASSQ Autism Screening Test is offered to children ages six to sixteen.

M-CHAT test or modified autism screening test

Questions:

1. Does the child enjoy rocking on his knees or hands?
2. Does the child show interest in other children?
3. Does the child like to use objects as steps and climb them up?
4. Does your child like to play hide and seek?
5. Does the child imitate actions during the game (pretends to talk on the phone or rock the doll)?
6. Does the child use the index finger when necessary for something?
7. Does he use his index finger to indicate his interest in an action, object, or person?
8. Are toys used by the child for their intended purpose (driving a car, dressing a doll, building fortresses from cubes)?
9. Has the child ever focused on objects of interest to him by bringing them and showing them to his parents?
10. Is the child able to maintain eye contact with adults for more than one or two seconds?
11. Has the baby ever shown signs of increased sensitivity to acoustic stimuli (asking to turn off the vacuum cleaner, covering his ears when listening to loud music)?
12. Does the child respond to smiling?
13. Does the child repeat the movements, intonation and facial expressions of adults?
14. Does the child respond when called by name?
15. When pointing to an object or toy in the room, will the child look at it?
16. Can the child walk?
17. If you look at any object, will the child repeat your actions?
18. Have you noticed that the child performs unusual actions with fingers near the face?
19. Does the baby try to draw attention to himself and to his actions?
20. Does the child think that he has a hearing problem?
21. Does the child understand what the people around him are talking about?
22. Have you noticed that the baby wandered aimlessly or did something automatically, giving the impression of a complete absence?
23. When meeting strangers, or encountering incomprehensible phenomena, does the child look into the parents’ faces to observe their reaction?

Decryption test

For each question of the test, answer “Yes” or “No”, and then compare the results with those given in the transcript:

1. No.
2. No (critical point).
3. No.
4. No.
5. No.
6. No.
7. No (critical point).
8. No.
9. No (critical point).
10. No.
11. Yes.
12. No.
13. No (critical point).
14. No (critical point).
15. No (critical point).
16. No.
17. No.
18. Yes.
19. No.
20. Yes
21. No.
22. Yes.
23. No.

If the answers to three common items or two critical items matched, then such a child should be consulted with a specialist.

Summing up

Autism is a disease, predominantly of childhood, which is characterized by the presence of a number of specific symptoms and signs. Their description often differs depending on the form of mental disorder, the age of the child and many other factors.

It is necessary to know the presence of which particular signs indicates the occurrence of this disease, so as not to confuse it with other diseases. And if several of them occur, you should seek the advice of a specialist as soon as possible.

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