3 ms·

I'm skeptical of the "it's just selection criteria" When the Somalis came to settle in Minneapolis, they called Autism the "Minnesota Disease". Now, that coul

I'm skeptical of the "it's just selection criteria" When the Somalis came to settle in Minneapolis, they called Autism the "Minnesota Disease". Now, that could be because it was suddenly diagnosed, but the impression I got is that it was unknown in the homeland. I also read once that autism tracked cable as it installed into neighborhoods. All of this is of course unsourced. But I think some of autism spike has a real component and my suspicion is that it has something to do with sun exposure, to link to the other non-coding post of the day: vitamin D, skin cancer, and sun exposure. https://rtc.umn.edu/autism/ https://rtc.umn.edu/autism/ https://slate.com/technology/2006/10/tv-might-cause-autism.html https://slate.com/technology/2006/10/tv-might-cause-autism.h...

elliekelly 4y ago
Wouldn’t having cable television in the 1980s be a pretty reliable indicator of a family’s socioeconomic status? Which would also be a pretty reliable indicator of the level of care, especially behavioral and mental health care the family could access? This seems a lot like “increased ice cream sales causes increased robberies” to me. Your comment about the Somali immigrants and the Minnesota healthcare system reminds me of a really fantastic book I’d long since forgotten called The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Spirit_Catches_You_and_You_Fall_Down https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Spirit_Catches_You_and_Y...
pvg 4y ago
it was unknown in the homeland. Somalia's child mortality under five is 20 times that of the US - it was, for many years, one of the most troubled spots on earth. https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.DYN.MORT?locations=SO-US https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.DYN.MORT?locations=S...
- tsol 4y ago
  You'd still expect to see some autistic people, unless for some reason autistic people died more often. I don't see any reason for that though
  - pvg 4y ago
    Click through to the graph, we're talking about an environment in which nearly 20% of children did not survive to age five. For 30 years.
  - orwin 4y ago
    I read a lot of Pierre Loti books, on rural Brittany pre-industrialization, i can totally understand how non functioning autistic children would die between the age of two to ten more easily than Asperger or non autistic children. In fact, any dyspraxic child in a coastal village would likely drown at a certain point.
wahern 4y ago
Culture plays a major factor in how disorders like schizophrenia manifest. A schizophrenic in the U.S. whose delusions emerge as and regress into debilitating paranoia (e.g. cameras everywhere, government out to get you) might have developed if raised in another society a different set of delusions which could functionally fit into the culture (e.g. classic example is as a spiritualist or oracle; an example which also speaks to our inability to imagine acceptable social roles and modern connotations regarding religious thinking.) And not just different, but less severe delusions. The stress which particularly violent delusions cause--directly (fear) and indirectly (detachment from society)--effect the progression and severeness of the disorder. I wouldn't be surprised if the same was true for autism.
tsol 4y ago
This makes a lot of sense to me. I've grown up with my feet in two communities, my smaller ethnic community and the greater local community. My ethnic community is really tight, and most people get along with one another. There's a shared kinship, so even the awkward kids are invited to hang out often. I've always felt the 'awkward'(as in seems stereotypically autistic) kids in my ethnic community were a little better at socializing and a little less anxiety-ridden than at school. I really think having a social environment makes a huge difference in severity of these kinds of things for those that are high functioning. Unfortunately, our greater society isn't very good at being an inclusive community. It's very dog eat dog, and most people don't have strong family and friend networks anymore. It's something that used to be important to humans, and was necessary to survive really. We don't need it anymore and as a result, neglect it. Why wouldn't that play a part in severity and presentation of autism?

elliekelly 4y ago

Wouldn’t having cable television in the 1980s be a pretty reliable indicator of a family’s socioeconomic status? Which would also be a pretty reliable indicator of the level of care, especially behavioral and mental health care the family could access? This seems a lot like “increased ice cream sales causes increased robberies” to me. Your comment about the Somali immigrants and the Minnesota healthcare system reminds me of a really fantastic book I’d long since forgotten called The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Spirit_Catches_You_and_You_Fall_Down https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Spirit_Catches_You_and_Y...

pvg 4y ago

it was unknown in the homeland. Somalia's child mortality under five is 20 times that of the US - it was, for many years, one of the most troubled spots on earth. https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.DYN.MORT?locations=SO-US https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.DYN.MORT?locations=S...

tsol 4y ago
You'd still expect to see some autistic people, unless for some reason autistic people died more often. I don't see any reason for that though
- pvg 4y ago
  Click through to the graph, we're talking about an environment in which nearly 20% of children did not survive to age five. For 30 years.
- orwin 4y ago
  I read a lot of Pierre Loti books, on rural Brittany pre-industrialization, i can totally understand how non functioning autistic children would die between the age of two to ten more easily than Asperger or non autistic children. In fact, any dyspraxic child in a coastal village would likely drown at a certain point.

wahern 4y ago

Culture plays a major factor in how disorders like schizophrenia manifest. A schizophrenic in the U.S. whose delusions emerge as and regress into debilitating paranoia (e.g. cameras everywhere, government out to get you) might have developed if raised in another society a different set of delusions which could functionally fit into the culture (e.g. classic example is as a spiritualist or oracle; an example which also speaks to our inability to imagine acceptable social roles and modern connotations regarding religious thinking.) And not just different, but less severe delusions. The stress which particularly violent delusions cause--directly (fear) and indirectly (detachment from society)--effect the progression and severeness of the disorder. I wouldn't be surprised if the same was true for autism.

tsol 4y ago

This makes a lot of sense to me. I've grown up with my feet in two communities, my smaller ethnic community and the greater local community. My ethnic community is really tight, and most people get along with one another. There's a shared kinship, so even the awkward kids are invited to hang out often. I've always felt the 'awkward'(as in seems stereotypically autistic) kids in my ethnic community were a little better at socializing and a little less anxiety-ridden than at school. I really think having a social environment makes a huge difference in severity of these kinds of things for those that are high functioning. Unfortunately, our greater society isn't very good at being an inclusive community. It's very dog eat dog, and most people don't have strong family and friend networks anymore. It's something that used to be important to humans, and was necessary to survive really. We don't need it anymore and as a result, neglect it. Why wouldn't that play a part in severity and presentation of autism?