Autism and compensatory reasoning by imagery

[Via FMH]

Many, but not all, of persons with the label 'autism spectrum disorder' do a great deal of visual reasoning. Temple Grandin in particular has written about her own way of problem solving. It's widely assumed that the brain is 'routing around problems' by repurposing visual subsystems to solve language and reasoning problems. The adaptive brain does some things better than conventional brains, and some things less well.

A recent neuroimaging study fills out this picture:

New Scientist Breaking News - How people with autism miss the big picture

Brains scans of people with the condition show that they place excessive reliance on the parietal cortex, which analyses images, even when interpreting sentences free of any imagery. In other people, the image centre appears to be active only when the sentences contain imagery.

The results agree with anecdotal reports that people with autism are fixated on imagery but struggle to interpret words and language. They frequently excel at recording visual detail, but overlook the bigger picture and the context that comes with it.

Researchers led by Marcel Just of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, scanned volunteers' brains while they were deciding if certain statements were true or false. Some of the statements relied on analysis of language alone, while others could only be understood by considering the imagery they conjured up. "The number 8, when rotated 90 degrees, looks like a pair of spectacles", for instance, needs both arithmetic interpretation and visualisation of the rotated number.

Just says that the observed over-reliance on the parietal cortex might have arisen to compensate for poor brain connections to the prefrontal cortex, which interprets language (Brain, DOI: 10.1093/brain/awll64)...

I'd like some evidence based recommendations on how to teach reading to someone who problem solves with the parietal cortex ...

Grandin again: Career advice for autistic teens and adults

Yet another book by the rather prolific Ms. Grandin, with co-authors: Amazon.com: Developing Talents: Careers for Individuals with Asperger Syndrome and High-Functioning Autism: Books: Temple Grandin,Kate Duffy,Tony Attwood. I think the audience is mostly parents of teenagers, but I'd like to take a look at this for a younger child.

Teaching empathy to autistic children

Temple Grandin, a good source of ideas on autism, writes that she only became capable of comforting others, or of appreciating the needs of others, when she was able to identify her needs and comfort herself.

This is the root of empathy. It is why, for example, strong children don't routinely hit weaker children. So if one needs to manage hitting problems with autism, then empathy seems a possible starting point. It would help, of course, if there was any data.

There's precious little. The best I've found is this 2004 literature review by an occupational therapist. It's the only starting point we have.

Best Practice Guidelines: Evidence Based Practice Information Sheet for Occupational Therapists Shanna Phelps, December 2004

....Summary of the Evidence

The evidence shows that children with Autism lack empathy. Teaching empathy to children with autism has been successfully done using a two-part modeling system. There has been a lot of research done on autism and empathy and only one model for Occupational Therapy has come from it. The supporting evidence has shown learning procedures done on children with autism that may have facilitated an empathetic response.

Implications for Consumers

Children with autism can learn skills towards empathizing from a two-part model system in an Occupational Therapy Pediatric Clinic. Occupational Therapists can teach such skills to children with autism, (i.e., recognizing facial expressions, pretend-play, and role playing) with a two-part model. It is still to be determined whether peer modeling can be a successful tool in teaching children with autism empathetic behavior.

Implications for Practitioners

There has not been enough research done on how OT's can intervene and teach children with autism to show empathy. There needs to be more research done on the two-part modeling system, introduced by Pepperberg and Sherman. This is an area that has potential for growth in Occupational Therapy practices.

Implications for Researchers

* More experimentation needs to be done in this area. The research is out there but the intervention plans have not yet been tried.
* The areas of empathy need to be broken down and put into practice and used to strengthen the social skills in children with autism. (i.e., identifying facial expressions, pretend play, identifying with peers, role play etc.).

Teaching reading to autistic children: whole word approach

The research literature is pretty clear that phonics works best for teaching reading to normal children. There's little or no good data on how to teach reading to autistic children.

Temple Grandin favors a phonics approach. This article, unfortunately pdf only, favors a whole word approach. Your mileage will vary:

Teaching Students With Autistic Spectrum Disorders to Read: A Visual Approach Leslie Todd Broun. Council for Exceptional Children. Vol 36n4 2002.

Teaching autistic children - Temple Grandin

In our case we've reached a hard wall in terms of teaching reading. This essay by Temple Grandin (thanks be to her) doesn't add any arrows to our quiver, but it summarizes a lot of things we've learned. It's a great reference for teachers and parents.