Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Autism beatup du jour
Did you see the story on the news tonight about the latest autism gene research breakthrough?
Huh?
They say they've made a great leap forward in discovering the genes for autism!
Really? Another one?
They say it could lead to the developent of new drugs that will "correct" the "deficits" of autism!
Golly Gosh.
They say it could lead to identifying babies who might become autistic, and prevent that happening through early intervention!
You're kidding!
A whopping 65% of people with autism have the gene! That's around two-thirds of people affected with autism have the gene!
WOW!
And 60% of people who don't have autism have the gene too!
WHAT???
Yeah, it's so nonsensical I'm not even bothering to blog about it. I'm glad you did, though, as stories like this deserve all the ridicule they get.
ReplyDeleteThis study has certainly had much more media exposure than it deserves.
ReplyDeleteTo their credit, I thought New Scientist did the best coverage that I've seen. Far form perfect, though. Lots of insulting language used, in the story and the online comments.
I might have a stab at estimating what percentage of people who have the gene are non-autistic. Do I dare?
I didn't think the New Scientist article was insulting. The title was misleading however. While the difference between 65% and 60% is statistically significant for the sample size they used, most people would have got the wrong impression from the articles title and beginning.
ReplyDeleteSaying that the gene had 9% greater incidence in the austistic would have conveyed their meaning better - but been less dramatic of course.
Josie, you may have invented a new word with your typo - "Austistic".
ReplyDeleteHow did you come up with 9%, shouldn't it be 5%? I'm happy to admit I'm no mathematician.
As an "Austistic" (an Australian autistic), I found the New Scientist article insulting because it was full of negative language to describe anything associated with autism, which is I'm sure a reflection of assumptions that the differences between NT and autists consist only of deficits on the part of autists.
The article began by describing autism as "the disorder" which is terminology that many autists find insulting. But in the part of the article that reported Prof. Simon Baron-Cohen's opinion, the article referred to "autism spectrum conditions" rather than using the more common negative terminology of "autism spectrum disorders". I'm sure there is a good reason why the article abruptly changed to non-insulting terminology in this part of the article - because it was quoting Prof. Baron-Cohen's words directly, and S B-C was the autism expert who showed admirable leadership a few years ago by switching to the value-neutral term "Autism Spectrum Conditions (ASC)". If he can manage to use non-insulting terminology with reference to autism, so can the media and other clinicians.
It's actually 8.3% - I did the maths wrong - but basically that's how much another 5% is out of 60% if that makes sense.
ReplyDeletehmm yeah, I guess I'm not as sensitive as you about the language. Just used to it maybe.
heehee I'm from Australia too - maybe it was a bit of a Freudian slip. (just read that bit)
ReplyDelete