She has discovered that people on the autism spectrum have increased sensitivity to visual motion in their peripheral field of vision, which affects how they perceive their environment and where they place themselves in time and space.
Some people with Asperger syndrome also have mental health issues or other conditions, meaning people need different levels and types of support. People with Asperger syndrome see, hear and feel the world differently to other people.
Some autistic people may experience problems seeing with “meaning” within their visual surroundings and environment. This means they may use other sensory inputs to gain meaning because they cannot internally mentalise the image, visuals or see the significance they hold.
A few different factors converge to explain why autistic people have an “overly full head” and disorganized thoughts, as well as why we may be scatterbrained, quick to lose oversight, and more prone to overstimulation and dysregulation. All these factors are likely caused by overconnectivity in the brain.
47% of autistic adults answered yes to: “Do you ever see shapes, lights, or colors even though there is nothing really there?” Increasing awareness of autistic hallucination-type experiences may help reduce stress & anxiety about having these experiences.
For people on the autism spectrum, the world is a bewildering place. With oversensitive sensory systems, they battle to process the maelstrom of information flowing into their brains. Often the result is sensory overload, leading to signature behaviours such as tantrums, anxiety and social withdrawal.
Some people who have autism actively avoid eye contact and appear confused and anxious when it occurs. Some seemed to make eye contact relatively early but later reported they were actually looking at something that fascinated them (such as their reflection in one's eyeglasses).
Analytical Thinking: People with an autism spectrum disorder think in a logically consistent way that leads to quick decision making. These thinkers can make decisions without experiencing the framing effect that inhibits most neurotypicals from making decisions without bias.
While cognitive empathy can be lower in people with autism, affective empathy—which is based on instincts and involuntary responses to the emotions of others—can be strong and overwhelming. In fact, newer research suggests that some people with autism may actually feel other people's emotions more intensely.
Autistic individuals have unique and valuable talents they bring to the workforce such as out-of-the-box thinking, a laser keen ability to recognize patterns (great for coding and repetitive tasks most neurotypical individuals find daunting) and a tendency towards loyalty.
A tendency to avoid eye contact is an early indicator of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), and difficulties with eye contact often persist throughout the lifespan. Eye contact difficulties may underlie social cognitive deficits in ASD, and can create significant social and occupational barriers.
The behaviors that are attributable to both autism and vision problems can include lack of eye contact, staring at spinning objects or light, fleeting peripheral glances, side viewing, and difficulty attending visually. Autistic people may also have problems coordinating their central and peripheral vision.
The most commonly reported problems were difficulties with depth perception; distorted perception of size, shape, and motion; seeing only small details and not the whole; and visual overstimulation.
Mind-blindness, mindblindness or mind blindness is a theory initially proposed in 1990 that claims that all autistic people have a lack or developmental delay of theory of mind (ToM), meaning they are unable to attribute mental states to others.
Although autistic people may struggle to interact with others, many autistic people have said they find interacting with other autistic people more comfortable.
Consistent with the hypothesis, higher autism traits were associated with a combination of greater deliberative and less intuitive reasoning styles. This is consistent with the clinical literature, where ASD is associated with a more logical and circumspect reasoning bias (Brosnan et al.
Research suggests that autistic people are more likely to experience feelings of loneliness compared to non-autistic people. This can be due to a lack of acceptance and understanding by society, making them feel excluded.
Facial expressions smooth social interactions: A smile may show interest, a frown empathy. People with autism have difficulty making appropriate facial expressions at the right times, according to an analysis of 39 studies1. Instead, they may remain expressionless or produce looks that are difficult to interpret.
Better understanding of theory of mind was related to greater proneness to guilt and pride, but only for children with ASD. These findings are important because these complex emotions are linked with both positive and negative social behaviors towards others and oneself.
Reasoning in people with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) has been characterised as being slower and more effortful than controls. People with ASD show a more circumscribed reasoning bias, and often take longer to make decisions.
The Caltech researchers isolated one very specific difference in autistic people's relations with others: that they don't tend to consider what others think about them at all. Researchers call this our "theory of mind" abilities - our intuitive skills for figuring out what other people think, believe and intend.
Every autistic person is different, but sensory differences, changes in routine, anxiety, and communication difficulties are common triggers.
Autistic people often prefer to view inanimate objects over people interacting. This atypical gaze pattern may help clinicians flag autism before other traits appear. The average age of diagnosis in the United States is 4 years.
In many cases, children with autism are known to have sensory issues. This could possibly be one of them. As a result of the greater stimulation they receive from eye contact, they end up shying away from it, creating the commonly observed phenomenon of autistic individuals avoiding eye contact.
A broader top face, a shorter middle face, wider eyes, a wider mouth, and a philtrum are some of the common facial features seen in children with ASD [16,17].