autism REVISE

Question 1

what type of disorder is autism?

Answer 1

a neuro-developmental disorder

Question 2

how many neurons are made per second in the peak of being a toddler?

Answer 2

2 million

Question 3

when do people start making memories and why?

Answer 3

around 3 years old as this is when the language and frontal lobes develop

memeories are conscious recall facilitated through language

Question 4

how many synapses will the brain have at 3 years old?

Answer 4

1000 trillion

Question 5

when does process of synaptic pruning begin and slow down

Answer 5

begins at 3

by adolescence around 1/2 synapses have been discarded

Question 6

which 2 parts of the brain are involved in empathy and fear response?

Answer 6

amygdala and hippocampus

Question 7

what emotions are we able to display from birth?

Answer 7

content and displeasure

Question 8

what emotions are we able to display from 6 months?

Answer 8

more complex emotions e.g surprise and sadness

Question 9

when do girls begin to be able to empathise?

Answer 9

1 year old`

Question 10

when does Theory of Mind begin to develop?

Answer 10

3 years old

Question 11

when does complex theory of mind develop?

Answer 11

7-9 years

Question 12

what is Theory of Mind?

explanation for it’s being impaired in autism?

Answer 12

being able to attribute mental states to others,
to infer what someone is thinking or feeling
know they have beliefs, desires and intentions that are different to one’s own

impaired in those with autism perhaps due to the fact they mainly look at the mouths of people and not the eyes which tend to reveal their emotions
also, no activation in amygdala which helps identify emotions when looking at faces

Question 13

what is empathy?

Answer 13

ability to understand and share the feelings of another

Question 14

what is cognitive empathy?

Answer 14

conscious drive to understand and infer what someone else is thinking

(theory of mind)

Question 15

what is affective empathy?

Answer 15

feel and share their emotion in order to respond appropriately

Question 16

how does Theory of Mind develop?

Answer 16

babies develop pre-verbal social skills e.g making noises

they begin to use gestures which leads to shared communication and shared perspcetive

normal communication enables a chilld to share in the perceptions and thoughts of those around them

Question 17

what is a description of austism?

Answer 17

when the ability to connect with people is absent

i.e both cognitive and affective empathy s impaired

Question 18

what percentage of children with austism have a learning difficulty?

Answer 18

75%

the rest have borderline learning disabilities

Question 19

is autism roughly equal across culture and social class?

Answer 19

yes

Question 20

which gender is diagnosed more frequently and is there an explanation for this?

Answer 20

3-4:1 to boys

girls diagnosed less as overlooked as shy and less effective in diagnosing girls than boys

Question 21

prevalence of autism in children?

Answer 21

affects 1 in every 110 children

Question 22

parental influences as a cause of austism?

Answer 22

old notion of “refrigerator mother” who is cold and rejecting causing autism in the child

no evidence to support this

although, possible for mother to seem cold if has autism herself

Question 23

MMR vaccine as a cause of autism?

Answer 23

no evidence for this being correct

however, many mothers stopped children from having this vaccine, leading to many having these diseases which may have onset autism due to brain injury

Kaye found incidence of autism increased from 0.3 to 2.1 per 10 000 from 1988 to 1999 when MMR vaccine at same level

Question 24

what are the factors in the triad of impairment of people with autism?

Answer 24

socialisation - e.g looking through people and turning their backs on them as see people as unpredictable

language developent - e.g refer to themselves in third person and not understand complex language like sayings or sarcasm

behaviour - e.g engage in repetitive acts

Question 25

why may people with autism view everything as threating and therefore people as unpredictable?

Answer 25

disconnection between cerebellum and other parts of the brain which acts as a warning system so not regulated

Question 26

biological causes of autism?

Answer 26

genetics : 91% of MZ twins and about 0% of DZ twins heritability estimate of 80% illness : e.g rubella direct cause as causes increased neurobiological abnormality in the brain

Question 27

neurobiological causes?

Answer 27

brain size increases between ages 2-4 larger than average which could indicate that neurons aren't being pruned correctly and therefore the brain is not maturing abnormalities in the cerebellum (linked to less exploratory behaviour) difference in size of the amygdala at different ages which is associated with social and emotional behaviour

Question 28

early signs of autism? social impairment

Answer 28

abnormal social play, impaired ability to make friends behaviours explained by lack of theory of mind as don't attribute differet emotions to others e.g Sally Anne experiment problem in joint attention (interactions requiring 2 people to pay attention to each other)

Question 29

early signs of autism? language impairment

Answer 29

less frequent babbling as a baby echolalia (echoing someone else) pronoun reversal and refering in 3rd person

Question 30

early signs of autism? restricted behavioural repertoire why they may behave in this way?

Answer 30

obsessional and ritualistic quality to behaviour distress over changes in routine play with inanimate objects why? attempting to impose order on external world as can't organise inteneral world

Question 31

psychological treatment of austism?

Answer 31

behavioural interventions and working with parents e.g 'super-parenting' at 2/3 years old which is micro parenting by involving experts to change trajectory from definietely autistic to slighty

Question 32

what are the goals of intervention?

Answer 32

reducing unusual behaviour and improving social and communication skills

Question 33

issues with intervention?

Answer 33

changing routine which frustrates child usual rewards such as social praise not rewarding

Question 34

what percetage of general population vs. prison population is autistic?

Answer 34

1.5% of general pop. 15% of prison pop. as have poor empathy, frustrated easily, misinterpretation of social cues and exlcuded from schools

Question 35

what may explain why those with autism find it comforting to act in the way that they do?

Answer 35

they may have wrongly learnt how to self-soothe and comfort themselves due to absense of soothing from and non-engaging parents so never taught the right way to comfort themselves distorted view of what's comforting

Question 36

what must be considered when diagnosising autism and other childhood disorders?

Answer 36

the age of the child and whether their behaviours are atypical for that age

Question 37

differences in classification of autsim in DSM4 and DSM5?

Answer 37

DSM 4 - autism under umbrella term of 'pervasive developmental disorders' along with Asperger's etc. but distinct disorders DSM5 - autism and Asperger's disorder called 'autism spectrum disorder' and considered one disorder (only difference is variance in severity)

Question 38

what is meant by externalising disorders? which gender are they more common in?

Answer 38

characterised by more outward-directed behaviours more common in boys

Question 39

what is meant by internalising disorders? which gender are they more common in?

Answer 39

characterised by more inward-focused experiences and behaviours more common in girls

Question 40

why is it often difficult to distinguish between a child with autism and intellectual development disorder? and what is the main difference between these 2 disorders?

Answer 40

many children with autism score below 70 on IQ tests autism - score badly on language questions but well on visuo-spatial tasks IDD - score badly in everything

Question 41

which type of children with autsim will generally have the best outcomes?

Answer 41

those with higher IQ and can speak before the age of 6

Question 42

drug treatments for autism effectiveness negatives comparison to behavioural treatments

Answer 42

haloperidol may reduce social withdrawal and maladaptive behaviours no improvement in social functioning and language impairment side effects e.g dyskinesias much less effective than behavioural treatments