Is Autism on the Rise?

04/28/2008

It takes a long time to become young.
Pablo Picasso

Evidence abounds that the incidence of children diagnosed with autism is on the rise. For example, in the state of Washington the number of students with autism jumped from 2,104 in 2001 to 6,000 in 2007. In the United Kingdom, the rate of autism diagnosis has risen from 50 in 100,000 in 1990 to 400 per 100,000 today.

Theories about the cause of this rise also abound, identifying a wide range of environmental factors. However, Dr. Dorothy Bishop and her colleagues at Oxford University now are proposing a much simpler explanation — that in the past many children with autism were misdiagnosed. Her article in the May 2008 issue of Developmental Medicine & Child Neurology, describes a research project where 38 teenagers who, as young children, were diagnosed as having a developmental language disorder. The researchers went back and re-diagnosed these children by interviewing them and their parents. The result was that fully one-third of these children were misclassified and, in fact, under current procedures, would have been considered to have some form of autism. Dr. Bishop concludes that while we should not assume that other factors are not still involved, it appears that a major cause for the increase in autism is simply changes in diagnostic criteria.

Exchange's Many Resources on Challenging Behavior

Exchange has a number of extremely helpful resources for supporting teachers in dealing with children with challenging behaviors:

Our book, Behavior, has 24 articles written by experts in the field on how to deal with challenging behavior.
Ten Out of the Box Training Kits on "Positive Discipline" provide directors with all the resources you need to conduct in-house training sessions.
An Exchange CEU course on Managing Challenging Behavior provides credit for reading 10 Exchange articles on the subject.
Exchange's newest resource, the DVD Facing the Challenge, is an expertly crafted video training tool.

GOOGLE HIRING EARLY CHILDHOOD EDUCATORS: Google has expanded its employee child development program by opening a world-class children's center in Mountain View, California and is now hiring teachers.

For more information about Exchange's magazine, books, and other products pertaining to ECE, go to www.ccie.com.