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Autism/is autism hereditary?

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Expert: - 9/13/2008


Question
My niece's husband is autistic and they have just had a baby boy and have been told that the chances of him developing autism are greater than those if they had a daughter. Is the correct? And are there any statistics on the chances of him developing autism? Thanks

Answer
Hi Rosie,

since autism is considered a genetic condition by many scientists today (which I think makes lots of sense), the chances that their child might also develop autism are a bit higher than normal (but then, where in the world would be a better place for a child with autism to grow up than with a parent who has the condition himself!). As for the boys/girls ratio, it is said, that more boys than girls develop autism (which is probably not true, autistic girls are probably just not diagnosed as often because autistic behaviour is often not so obvious, or not considered unusual in girls (i.e. it's more okay for a girl than a boy to be quiet, off in their own world, shy with people etc.).

Here's a link to an article about the genetic component of autism. I couldn't find any statistics, but as I said, it's a bit more probable for them that their child develops autism than for a neurotypical couple. The article here says that if one child has autism, there may be a 10 percent chance that a sibling may develop autism too. Maybe the same can be said if a parent has autism (not sure here, though). There seems not to be much research done in the field (which is probably due to the fact that the milder variants of autism were widely unknown until some 20 years ago, and that in the heads of many researchers such things as autistic *adults* who live with a partner, marry and have children don't even exists...most research in the field is centered around autistic *children*)

http://mednews.wustl.edu/tips/page/normal/9458.html

There are a few pages for autistic parents:

http://cap.autistics.org/
http://www.neurodiversity.com/autistic_parents.html
http://posautive.blogspot.com/2008/04/autistic-parents.html

Hope this helps !
C.

Autism

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*DISCLAIMER*

Please note I am not a healthcare professional or a doctor.
I cannot provide a diagnosis or give any medical advice.
Therefore I cannot answer questions like "is my child autistic ?" other than by telling you to go and see a specialist
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Please be aware that if you are in the US it will usually take at least 24 hours until I can answer your question, as I'm in Europe and don't have access to my email during the day. I also cannot answer questions concerning the US educational or law system (other than by looking up things on google, but that's probably not the expertise you need), as I'm not in the US.
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Please also be aware that I'm a person with autism. My answers may sometimes be very blunt and direct and I may tell you things you won't like to hear. Diplomacy is certainly not among my talents. I'm never being rude on purpose, and I always try not to hurt or offend people, but it has happened before and may happen again. It's NEVER on purpose. I just want to help.
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What I *can* do for you is gather information on any aspect of autism and therapy of autism you're interested in and give you my personal oppinion about it (if you want to hear it) or, if it applies, tell you about my personal experience. I can answer all questions about what life is like for an autistic person.

I can also answer questions asked in German or French (but will have to answer in English to questions asked in French as my French is a bit rusty).

Ich beantworte gerne auch Fragen auf Deutsch.

Vous pouvez poser des questions en Francais, si cela ne vous dérange pas que je responds en anglais.

Experience


As I'm not doing well right now and am not in the shape of answering questions well - I recieved a few low ratings lately - I'll take a break from AllExperts for the next few weeks/until I'm doing better

I am an adult diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome/High Functioning Autism and ADD.

In the past years I have also read a lot about autism and its comorbid conditions and related subjects (as I am experiencing symptoms of most of these or know others who do) , so I have accumulated a lot of layman knowledge in this area (AD(H)D, Tourette's Syndrome, OCD, sleep disorders, allergies, sensory integration dysfunction, learning difficulties, left/right-brain, giftedness, Irlen Syndrome, prism glasses, executive dysfunction (aka. "inertia"), "special" diets).

Education/Credentials
None in the field of autism, apart from being autistic myself !

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