Why Tom Clements’ Guardian feature on autism draws criticisms from the autistic community
The recent UK newspaper article ‘What is autism? How the term became too broad to have meaning any more’, by Tom Clements, has drawn criticisms from some quarters. Namely that (since the amalgamation of autism diagnoses into the phrase ‘autism’), he seemingly leans...
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What is neurodiversity, in the context of autism?
It is worth exploring what neurodiversity means, in the context of autism. Many adult autists that support the neurodiversity paradigm don't need the concept spelling out, but we here at Spectra.blog, we have many more people that are 'new' to the world of autism...
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Is your learning style also your autistic Achilles heel? Your sensory downfall?
This author has been thinking lately about how we learn (from a sensory perspective), and how autists' sensory challenges affect this. The primary or dominant learning styles of all individuals are said to use the three main sensory receivers: Visual, Auditory, and...
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‘Will the family understand an autism diagnosis?’
A mum we know whose child may be autistic was recently asked whether her parents, the child's grandparents, would understand an autism diagnosis. The mum wasn't sure, and her companion remarked that she doubted the grandparents would understand. The connotations were...
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Autism and anxiety – if A is for autism, then it is most definitely also for anxiety
Anxiety and other similar problems are rife in the 21st-century, but for many people the issues are episodic or caused by an obvious external factor. (Anxiety UK reports that anxiety disorders are very common, with 1 in 6 adults regularly experiencing some form of...
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Quirks and autistic attributes
Let's talk about quirks, in connection with autism spectrum neurologies. A quirk is a little difference, or something unusual – the Cambridge English Dictionary describes it as: ‘An unusual habit or part of someone's personality, or something that is strange and...
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A dual diagnosis of autism and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) – what are the implications?
A dual diagnosis of autism and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is becoming more prevalent now, due to clinicians' ability to diagnose both neurologies under the latest diagnostic criteria. (The older DSM-4 for example specified that an autism or 'ASD'...
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Why are autists irritating to other individuals? Examining: confused first impressions; NTs’ reluctance to interact with ‘different’ people; as well as autists’ quirks & behaviours, and ‘failure to be neurotypical’
We wanted to write an article about not only interactions between autistic individuals and the people around them (of any neurology); but more importantly, how we as autistics deal with these interactions. Specifically, this article looks at some of the negative...
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Patterns, sameness and hyper-focus – the autistic special interest, or obsessive thought process
(Our opening picture shows Ethan Fineshriber, a leading American martial artist with a second-degree black belt, who fights in the Extreme Martial Arts black belt boys’ division of the American Taekwondo Association. Pic by the ATA.) One common trait among autists is...
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Autistic stimming, or ‘self stimulating’ behaviour – calming, satisfying and recalibrating
We have been asked a few times about 'stims', and while we have mentioned them within other articles (see directly below, in an article on autistic meltdown), we thought it would be useful to delve deeper in a single blog post....
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