NEURO/DEVELOPMENTAL LEVELS OF ADULTS WITH AUTISM SPECTRUM
A developmental milestone is a significant neurological step in the progressing physical, emotional, intellectual, mental, spiritual maturity of a person to adulthood. |
Autism Spectrum Disorder is a term used to describe a spectrum of neuro-developmental disorders. It is genetic and results from neurological factors that delay or prevent the developmental maturity of many or sometimes nearly all functional brain systems. |
Failure to reach certain significant mature milestones can have an aberrant effect on a person’s ability to function successfully in life and relationships. |
MATURE DEVELOPMENTAL MILESTONES REACHED BY NEUROTYPICAL ADULTS |
WHERE LEVELS OF DEVELOPMENT MAY ARREST IN ADULTS WITH ASD |
EFFECTS ON ADULTS WITH ASD AS A RESULT OF NOT REACHING MATURE MILESTONES |
Joint attention |
Interest only in one's own needs; OCD; narcissism |
Difficulty sharing experiences & interests |
Theory of mind/Theory of own mind – awareness of self and others |
Inability to see one’s own or another's point of view |
Inability to be “in someone else's shoes”; fails to acknowledge and denies truth of other’s view |
Ability to read and interpret body language / facial expression, pragmatic language skills |
Lack of pragmatic language skills, Limited understanding of body language / facial expressions |
Inability to register others’ emotions |
Ability to repair & maintain relationships, have life-long friendships |
Inability to repair and nurture relationships |
Few, if any, real friends |
Emotional reciprocity |
Lack of empathy for people |
Inability to relate to or sense others’ emotions |
Desire or need to socialise and make "small talk", interest in others |
Inability to see the need for small talk; socialises for own ego/manipulation; narcissism |
Difficulties in making relationships, uses role playing, copying & masking outside home to cover deficiencies |
Sense of humour / understanding of irony & human frailty |
Limited humour/ inability to laugh at oneself and one’s own mistakes |
Limited ability to admit to mistakes, sees others as the cause of their difficulties |
Abstract language; meta language understanding |
Limited to literal understanding of language; lack of cognitive complexity |
Limited ability to understand irony /metaphor / jokes / idioms; inability to understand complexity of thought and language |
Desire to share own and others’ interests |
Obsession with own interests; OCD |
Difficulty sharing anything |
Ability to generalise learning to new situations |
Rigid compartmentalisation of concepts |
Inflexibility in learning new ways and growing |
Abstract thinking; higher order thinking skills |
"Concrete" thinking, lacking schema changes after childhood; lacking insight/inferences/extrapolation skills |
Little appreciation of "hidden" meaning in life; unable or very slow/unwilling to learn new ways of being |
Imagination and ability to dream of possibilities |
Solitary imagination |
Tendency to remain "stuck in a rut” in life |
Ability to share problems and concerns as a means to solve them |
Inability to share problems or foresee consequences and possibilities; opportunistic meeting own needs only |
Tendency to get into problem situations; “Mr Magoo” Syndrome; oblivious to turbulence of problems |
Social conscience, sense of “fair play” and natural justice |
Undeveloped social conscience & overly strict adherence to own rules; narrowly focussed, unable to interpret nuance in life |
POSSIBLE psychopathic, sociopathic or criminal behaviour, black and white attitude to life; extreme zeal for perceived righteous pursuits or power; “god-like”; authoritarian, opportunistic |
Ability to react & act spontaneously |
Inappropriate responses or no response |
Awkwardness, lack of caring in family and social situations; poor parenting |
Innate knowledge about social behaviour |
Lack of real understanding of social behaviour |
Desire for isolation or over socialisation |
Comfort, pleasure & pain in sensory experiences |
Sensory overload or unawareness |
Excess or avoidance of appropriate touch & physical contact |
Intuition about life; innate knowing |
Lack of intuition |
Lack of common-sense |
Balanced development of emotional and intellectual skills |
Development of intellectual skills over emotional skills |
Interactions limited to intellectual responses unless prompted |
Ability to show love and respect in tone of voice, eyes, treatment of others |
Limitation to "gifts of service" |
Cold and unloving behaviour, lack of compassion, lack of empathy |
Attachment to people, places and things |
Lack of attachment to people |
Attitude that other people are dispensable |
Reflection and insight into self |
Lack of sense of self in relation to others |
Inability to reflect on own life |
Ability to make decisions using emotions and intellect equally |
Uncertainty of own feelings about things |
Poor decision making / naiveté |
Executive functioning |
Lack of executive functioning and organisational skills; |
Inability to navigate complex processes and use forethought to perceive consequences; passive aggression |
Ability to prioritise tasks and multi-task |
Limited to one task at a time, usually a special interest, strict routine or obsession |
Neglect of urgent responsibilities / panic |
Context awareness, fast intuition; unconscious cognition |
Context blindness; mindblindness; lack intuition |
Prompt Dependent; inability to react/behave/adapt spontaneously to social contexts/changes or making necessary exceptions to rules |
Able to generalise implicitly and explicitly on global and local tasks |
Unable to generalise learning |
Inability to adapt appropriate strategies when particular responses/ behaviours are essential |
Ability to gain wisdom from experiences |
Lack of generalisation of learning and awareness of important experiences |
Strongly inflexible or absent personal philosophy / ideology |
Physical co-ordination |
Poor fine/ gross motor skills; Tourette’s; hand flapping |
Unusual gait, unco-ordinated movement, tics; inappropriate facial expressions; immature attempts at “play” |
Mature ability to control thoughts, emotions, words, actions according to circumstances. |
Lack of impulse control, uncontrolled meltdowns, inappropriate anger; rage cycle |
ADHD, ADD, OCD, tantrums; manipulates and controls others by fear, anger, anxiety, verbal/physical violence; possible depressive symptoms |
© J.A. Morgan BEd Grad Dip 2017