4 ms·

I recall reading more than a few articles about a strong positive correlation between socioeconomic status and autism diagnosis rate. What I've never seen addr

by roc 16y ago

I recall reading more than a few articles about a strong positive correlation between socioeconomic status and autism diagnosis rate. What I've never seen addressed in any of the underlying studies, was whether the rate could be determined to be tied to prevalence of condition or prevalence of diagnosis. Given the "flavor of the month" status that Autism Spectrum Disorders have attained, I'm very skeptical that the socioeconomic link is anything more than the same helicopter parenting that seemed to lead the explosion of attention disorder diagnoses and prescription rates.

runT1ME 16y ago
I didn't mean to imply autism was caused by economic status. What I meant to say is its probably a fair assumption that families of different means would consume a vast range of different products in many forms. Finding one study linking something as common as vinyl is not a good indicator. I'd bet you'd find the same correlation with upscale automobiles....
mkramlich 16y ago
If there is a positive correlation between higher socioeconomic status (especially in the last 10-20 years) and a higher autism diagnosis rate, I have a theory to explain it. My pet theory is that as the rise of the Internet and Web has placed higher economic demand for people with certain kinds of mental skills and thought processes (programmers, computer hardware designers, etc.), and that class of people has generally risen in wealth, and also in marriage suitability (more money, success, greater attraction to women, etc.) that then causes those kinds of people to be more likely to have kids, and thus you see a spike in kids who inherited those mental traits from their parents -- I'm guessing mostly from the father, assuming my theory is right. It could be a combination of that effect plus the rise in widespread Internet usage, and the massive increase in "geek out" behavior that has caused in the general population (surfing the web, clicking on every little link, web forums, text messaging, etc. all the kinds of things that a hyper-focused nerdy or Asperger's like person would be more likely to engage in).
- runT1ME 16y ago
  Likely it is the opposite though. Wood flooring is more $$ than vinyl flooring...

by roc 16y ago

runT1ME 16y ago

I didn't mean to imply autism was caused by economic status. What I meant to say is its probably a fair assumption that families of different means would consume a vast range of different products in many forms. Finding one study linking something as common as vinyl is not a good indicator. I'd bet you'd find the same correlation with upscale automobiles....

mkramlich 16y ago

If there is a positive correlation between higher socioeconomic status (especially in the last 10-20 years) and a higher autism diagnosis rate, I have a theory to explain it. My pet theory is that as the rise of the Internet and Web has placed higher economic demand for people with certain kinds of mental skills and thought processes (programmers, computer hardware designers, etc.), and that class of people has generally risen in wealth, and also in marriage suitability (more money, success, greater attraction to women, etc.) that then causes those kinds of people to be more likely to have kids, and thus you see a spike in kids who inherited those mental traits from their parents -- I'm guessing mostly from the father, assuming my theory is right. It could be a combination of that effect plus the rise in widespread Internet usage, and the massive increase in "geek out" behavior that has caused in the general population (surfing the web, clicking on every little link, web forums, text messaging, etc. all the kinds of things that a hyper-focused nerdy or Asperger's like person would be more likely to engage in).

runT1ME 16y ago
Likely it is the opposite though. Wood flooring is more $$ than vinyl flooring...