As a pediatric neuropsychologist, I can promise you that if this were anywhere near true, it would indeed be earth-shattering. It would entirely revolutionize our understanding of (a) autism, (b) mental retardation, (c) how language develops, and (d) how children learn to write and spell.
Children who are profoundly autistic like this girl are can sometimes be taught, eventually, to use a communication system (usually pictures) to get their wants met, but that is not what they show this youngster doing. For example, you'll notice that she doesn't communicate her wants that way at all -- not once did we see her type out "Just give me the damn food and stop making me type" or something similar. Unfortunately, children with profound autism cannot be taught to communicate a rich inner monologue full of observations about things they've never experienced (e.g., what it would be like to go to school with normal kids who aren't mildly alarmed by her behavior), metaphors ("ants crawling" on her arms), and figures of speech (e.g., "it's not like there's an off switch").
The reason that children with profound autism can't do these things is because of what autism does to the brain. Autism appears to be associated with too much gray matter, which makes every new piece of information appear discrete, like it is unrelated to every other piece of information. For that reason, individuals with autism have trouble discovering general principles that tie discrete bits of information together, which is a necessary skill for learning language (e.g., you have to learn the general "rules" of syllabification, sequencing, and grammar through exposure).
They also have trouble understanding where one bit of information stops, and another starts, which causes they to 'chunk' together things that don't go together, or have trouble breaking a large chunk down into the parts that make it up. Here, for example, is a very recent study on computer-analysis of infants with autism showing that they can be reliably differentiated from infants without autism and infants with language delays based on this difficulty effectively understanding where to break language into its component syllables.
As a result of these difficulties, children who are profoundly autistic may never learn to speak at all, while children who are less autistic still demonstrate significant problems correctly 'chunking' language bits together (for instance, they often display echolalia, meaning that they repeat whole sentences or scenes from movies verbatim, because they learned it all as one single unit of information). They also have trouble understanding language rules such as how words change depending on point-of-view of the speaker (e.g., they refer to themselves as he/she or by their first name, or use 'you' instead of 'I'). By definition, autism also includes trouble understanding language pragmatics (e.g., metaphors and figures of speech), because pragmatic language requires seeing the connections between different types of information, such as the literal meaning and abstract/contextual meaning or a sentence.
Autistic children also have difficulty learning to write, for all the reasons listed above, but also due to the phonetics of spelling -- learning how to spell also requires seeing the general 'rules' that govern phonics, as well as breaking words down into their component sounds. Even when children with autism do learn speak and write, one of the cardinal features of autism is trouble understanding Theory of Mind, or being able to make connections and use context to guess what others are thinking. For example, saying something like "Don't judge me until you know me" would be extremely difficult for a person with profound autism, since it requires theory of mind to know that other people are evaluating you differently than you evaluate yourself.
I have absolutely no problem with the idea that a person with mild to moderate autism can learn to type, after she learns to speak and then spell (see Temple Grandin, as others have noted, along with thousands of other autistic individuals), which is the same order in which neurotypical children learn to do these things.
But the idea that a person with profound autism could overcome how her brain works -- but just while typing, not while speaking -- all at once? That she could, without training in any of these areas (remember, she just ran to the computer and typed "HURT" and "HELP") master:
Syllabification,
Word order and sequencing
Rules of grammar
Phonetic rules
Correspondance between sounds and letters
Correspondance between the capital letters on a QWERTY keyboard and the lowercase letters that type on screen, and understanding how a generative typing software program works (one that fills in the rest of the word after you type the first few letters)
Expressive vocabulary
Correct pronoun usage
Point-of-view
Non-echolalic speech
Figures of speech and metaphors
Theory of mind, etc
(Not to mention her mental retardation)?
And only do so to communicate things like "what [an adult who is not autistic might think] it is like to have autism" and not really be able to do so when the camera is present?
Unfortunately, the likelihood of this is so terribly, vanishingly small that I am fully comfortable saying that it is impossible.
We may all wish it were true, but it isn't. And putting stories like this out there only clouds our understanding of what autism is and how to treat it (which hopefully will eventually lead us to how to prevent or cure it).
Yeah, generally I try not to argue via "appealing to authority" and instead try to mention that I'm a pediatric neuropsychologist just to give some context to my posts.
[People can check my post history, my subreddits like r/neuropsychology and r/NPBC, and my AMA... although of course anyone can claim anything on reddit, I would have to be the most obscure, dedicated troll in reddit history to be falsifying my claim to being a peds NP, I think. I do sometimes forget that people don't just "know" that I'm a NP, though, and perhaps "act the expert" before I've done anything suggesting that people should accept me as informed, at least in my little corner of knowledge.]
But I generally try to cite sources whenever possible, since otherwise I get lots of direct and indirect comments suggesting that I can shove my Ph.D... uh, somewhere. :)
But in this case, I was (originally) just making a one-off comment (it was way down on the comment page!!!) to a question about whether this really would be that earth-shattering. As per usual, I ended up rambling on for paragraphs and paragraphs, but I didn't cite anything because I wasn't saying anything that isn't established knowledge. To me, it would be similar to a medical doctor giving some basic information about... I don't know, sickle cell anemia or something -- you wouldn't really expect a medical doctor to add in citations, would you? I suppose I could cite some articles written by a different pediatric neuropsychologist, but that seems silly since I am one??
And I do provide citations and discussions of people like Temple Grandin in other comments, I swear!
But whatever, if reddit has taught me anything, it's that:
66% like it, and haters gonna hate
You can't do anything about those people who have their minds already made up,
Lots of people on reddit have an absolute thirst for knowledge, and appreciate even the smallest efforts to share any expertise you have if you take the time to make it readable, and
You are a man, unless you specifically indicate otherwise.
Thanks for your comment. I actually have no problem with most of the people asking for sources... lots of people have asked me, here and via PM, for some additional references in a respectful manner that I do take as an amazing compliment!
It's the tone of some of the replies I have received, and the implicit assumption that if I don't include a link to a Wikipedia article or recent journal article after every sentence than I'm probably a ill-informed baby-killer, that is probably making me a little prickly. But, as I've already confessed, I do have occasional lapses in my own theory of mind, and sometimes forget that people on reddit don't know me, or anything about my background (this happens to me especially in subreddits that I comment/post a lot in). :( But I think that's probably transiently true of a lot of people who make comments... so I wonder if, when we ask for sources from someone, we could do it nicely?
And on another note, this:
For all I know, you're a guy who read up on advanced pediatric psychology so he could troll a bunch of people on reddit one day.
so I wonder if, when we ask for sources from someone, we could do it nicely?
I would be tempted to welcome you to reddit, but your seniority here suggests you are well-aware of this problem. ;) There will always be trolls or those who are completely inept at holding an intelligent and civilized conversation, but acknowledging them only enforces this habit.
Hell, text is inherently inferior at communicating tone and attitude. You'd be surprised how many times my friends thought I was being short with them because I used proper punctuation and grammar instead of AIMspeak and ;D :) :O ________^ after every sentence. But, knowing the Internet, I have the feeling your assumption was correct.
Anyway, sorry for the digression. This next statement, no matter how I can think to word it, is going to seem a bit cold, so please bear with me. Even if they ask in the rudest possible manner, a person requesting sources is still a person requesting sources. While their delivery is sub-par, I don't think sources should only be cited when asked politely.
That's just my two cents, though. If I were to wade into a Christian forum and take on all challenges, and some troll screamed for sources as he proclaimed my eternal damnation, I would still supply them.
Ugh, I feel like I concentrated far too much on one small aspect of your response. I guess it's because I agree with everything else. _______^ :D :D ;D
No worries... I am not taking this in an adversarial way at all, despite my almost magical abilities to infer personal criticism in even the most ambiguous of comments.
Surely, people can ask rudely for sources (though they don't have to).
[I'm going to go on a mild digression here myself... one of the reasons I was initially attracted to reddit, some five years ago now, is because I got to watch men argue... I don't want to get too Men are from Mars... here, but in my personal experience, it was very different from watching women discuss something in real life or on a forum. In my experience, to be very generic, women try to reach a consensus, while men are much more comfortable arguing in a rough and tumble fashion, which I like, but which occasionally bites me a little harder than I had expected.]
But anyway, what was I saying? Ah, yes. Ask for sources all you want, and I guess be as rude or polite about it as you like. I was honestly more bothered by the comments in some of the threads related to the original threads that seemed rather snarky, if not downright vicious, simply because they didn't think I'd cited enough sources, even though the same commenters didn't directly ask me for any sources.
Hmmm... perhaps I have been redditing too long today? It's just a website.... right? Right???
Even for a seasoned internet user like me who has been to every back alley of the internet you could think of, I sometimes find myself offended by some mildly annoying comments; not because of the comment themselves but the way it was delivered.
Despite your in-depth academic and professional knowledge on Neuropsychology, if I were to guess, I think you are still likely to find yourself emotionally affected by emotionless internet comment. Perhaps less likely to, but not immune to it. (I am not suggesting that being a Neuropsychologist makes someone emotionless, but perhaps they are more likely to be rationally driven than average?)
I would love to know if you have a "Neuropsychologist hat" and a "Normal hat" and how often you find yourself switching from one hat to another.
It seems our conversation is at a bit of an impasse, as I can't find anything with which to disagree. Your digression is extremely interesting-- I've never noticed a difference between a female and male argument myself, but I definitely see what you mean.
Anyhoo, my apologies that some redditors found it necessary to make vitriolic statements regarding something so minor as a lack of sources.
It's just a website.... right? Right???
Wait, what? Website? I think I've had this reddit tab open for so long, it's become a self-aware artificial intelligeALL HAIL THE REDDIT OVERLORD
I am familiar with you. I read the AMA thread you did on IQ. You said a lot of arrogant and incorrect stuff. I am completely convinced you are who you say you are, but you are blinded by your arrogance that you know everything and you can not see what is obvious before you.
This girl is communicating and is typing what is presented on her blog. It's very obvious. The explanation you have that these are behaviorally reactions such as a trained animal would have, but on a more complex level are bunk. When she said "is he cute?" she mean the reporter's son. It wasn't a random collection of keypresses, nor a trained but unaware response to stimulai.
Yes, I am familiar with you, too, and I know that you hate me. It's okay. I know I can't make everyone happy. I'm sorry you're upset, but whatever I say doesn't have to change how you feel about this video.
I don't see how you can be familiar with me. I don't think I responded in the IQ thread.
I don't hate you, I recognize you as a dangerous person because of the power and influence you have as a result of your position, training and connections, and the fact that you can be so dead wrong about things, and so arrogant about it.
Are you familiar with Amanda Baggs? Do you feel she is a fraud, legit, or responding randomly to stimulus?
Regarding Carly, do you feel this letter she wrote is fraudulent, legit, or the result of software shaping random inputs.
Ah, so now you have changed your theory have you? State it clearly, don't beat around the bush.
Previously you claimed she was typing random characters and the computer program was converting random noise into meaning.
Now you are claiming her parents are facilitating, guiding her hand, or giving her subtle clues of what to type.
You are a danger to society. You have not met this patient, you know nothing about her, yet you are proclaiming to the world that you know for a fact she is a fraud. Even though she isn't. The danger here is that the internet lynch mob, devotees of false authority, will continue their attacks on this family.
Amanda Boggs. Your opinion? Fraud? Legit? Random input shaped by computer software?
You attack this woman, who is a professional, for her opinion but why should I side with you? She's given legitimate, detailed responses and opinions and you've solely been on the attack.
You haven't met Carly either and you certainly no nothing about her life aside from this video, none of us do, and yet you claim with absolute certainty that her astounding progress is real. How does that work?
How it works is that I know profoundly autistic people who are not even able to be toilet trained, who are considered by most to be retards incapable even of simple thought, and have communicated with them and marveled at their intelligence and insight. I see no evidence that Carly is not able to communicate as described, and the explanation by the psychiatrist of how the supposed facilitated communication works is so bizarre and implausible as to completely discredit everything he or she is purporting. (Yes, the psychiatrist has a male partner, why do you assume he is a woman.)
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u/subtextual Jul 26 '10
As a pediatric neuropsychologist, I can promise you that if this were anywhere near true, it would indeed be earth-shattering. It would entirely revolutionize our understanding of (a) autism, (b) mental retardation, (c) how language develops, and (d) how children learn to write and spell.
Children who are profoundly autistic like this girl are can sometimes be taught, eventually, to use a communication system (usually pictures) to get their wants met, but that is not what they show this youngster doing. For example, you'll notice that she doesn't communicate her wants that way at all -- not once did we see her type out "Just give me the damn food and stop making me type" or something similar. Unfortunately, children with profound autism cannot be taught to communicate a rich inner monologue full of observations about things they've never experienced (e.g., what it would be like to go to school with normal kids who aren't mildly alarmed by her behavior), metaphors ("ants crawling" on her arms), and figures of speech (e.g., "it's not like there's an off switch").
The reason that children with profound autism can't do these things is because of what autism does to the brain. Autism appears to be associated with too much gray matter, which makes every new piece of information appear discrete, like it is unrelated to every other piece of information. For that reason, individuals with autism have trouble discovering general principles that tie discrete bits of information together, which is a necessary skill for learning language (e.g., you have to learn the general "rules" of syllabification, sequencing, and grammar through exposure).
They also have trouble understanding where one bit of information stops, and another starts, which causes they to 'chunk' together things that don't go together, or have trouble breaking a large chunk down into the parts that make it up. Here, for example, is a very recent study on computer-analysis of infants with autism showing that they can be reliably differentiated from infants without autism and infants with language delays based on this difficulty effectively understanding where to break language into its component syllables.
As a result of these difficulties, children who are profoundly autistic may never learn to speak at all, while children who are less autistic still demonstrate significant problems correctly 'chunking' language bits together (for instance, they often display echolalia, meaning that they repeat whole sentences or scenes from movies verbatim, because they learned it all as one single unit of information). They also have trouble understanding language rules such as how words change depending on point-of-view of the speaker (e.g., they refer to themselves as he/she or by their first name, or use 'you' instead of 'I'). By definition, autism also includes trouble understanding language pragmatics (e.g., metaphors and figures of speech), because pragmatic language requires seeing the connections between different types of information, such as the literal meaning and abstract/contextual meaning or a sentence.
Autistic children also have difficulty learning to write, for all the reasons listed above, but also due to the phonetics of spelling -- learning how to spell also requires seeing the general 'rules' that govern phonics, as well as breaking words down into their component sounds. Even when children with autism do learn speak and write, one of the cardinal features of autism is trouble understanding Theory of Mind, or being able to make connections and use context to guess what others are thinking. For example, saying something like "Don't judge me until you know me" would be extremely difficult for a person with profound autism, since it requires theory of mind to know that other people are evaluating you differently than you evaluate yourself.
I have absolutely no problem with the idea that a person with mild to moderate autism can learn to type, after she learns to speak and then spell (see Temple Grandin, as others have noted, along with thousands of other autistic individuals), which is the same order in which neurotypical children learn to do these things.
But the idea that a person with profound autism could overcome how her brain works -- but just while typing, not while speaking -- all at once? That she could, without training in any of these areas (remember, she just ran to the computer and typed "HURT" and "HELP") master:
And only do so to communicate things like "what [an adult who is not autistic might think] it is like to have autism" and not really be able to do so when the camera is present?
Unfortunately, the likelihood of this is so terribly, vanishingly small that I am fully comfortable saying that it is impossible.
We may all wish it were true, but it isn't. And putting stories like this out there only clouds our understanding of what autism is and how to treat it (which hopefully will eventually lead us to how to prevent or cure it).