12   October 2025 would have been Donna Williams’ 62 nd birthday — a day to remember not only an extraordinary woman but also a mind...

The term “alexithymia” was coined by psychotherapist Peter Sifneos (1973) to describe a relative constriction in emotional functioning, poverty of fantasy life and inability to find appropriate words to describe their emotions. For lack of a more suitable term, he called these characteristics ‘alexithymic’[ 1 ]. Since that time research investigating the alexithymia construct has considerably broadened: Alexithymia  is a multifaceted personality trait characterised by difficu

The Diagnostic Difficulties Chronic pain is quite common in autism , yet it is often unrecognised (and undiagnosed). The diagnosis of chronic pain in autistic individuals poses unique and intricate challenges due to various factors. Overlap of autism symptoms with pain signs The overlap between autism symptoms and pain indicators can lead to the misinterpretation of pain signals. Careful consideration and comprehensive assessments are necessary to differentiate pain-related b

Overlapping symptoms and differences Psychosis Psychosis is not a diagnosis in and of itself but rather a cluster of symptoms present in...

Distinguishing between hallucinations and “hallucinations” Hallucinations are said to be false perceptions that occur in the absence of appropriate external stimuli, and are usually seen by only one individual. Most often they are experienced by people with specific kinds of mental illness, or under the influence of drugs or alcohol. However, it is important to distinguish between hallucinations and “hallucinations”. For instance, it is known that children normally have much

Sometimes sensory hypersensitivities are misinterpreted as extrasensory perception (ESP) as ‘normal’ people not only fail to see, hear, smell or feel what some autistic individuals can, but also find it hard to imagine that these experiences are possible because ‘normal’ people are blind, deaf and dumb to the stimuli which are everyday experiences for some autistic individuals. However, there is nothing extrasensory about their ability to hypersense as some autistic people’

A painful truth Sensory stimuli can be experienced very differently by autistic individuals. Just because we may not feel something, it does not mean that they don’t. It’s something that is so simple to understand, yet not knowing anything about it makes you feel unable to help your own child. As he grew, I began to notice more and more my son’s very acute aversion to some things we would not think twice about. Seemingly mundane tasks such as getting his hair cut or his nails

Autistic people have unique ways of communicating and interacting that are rooted in their unique ways of thinking and experiencing the world. While there is much variation between autistic individuals, the following guidelines are a few good things to consider when communicating with autistic people. - Distance : Many autistic people are hypertactile and may be afraid that people who get too close might touch them, or they may simply feel uncomfortable with the nearness of

The Intense World Syndrome and other ‘sensory theories’ Although already in the very first descriptions of autistic children, researchers...

In autism, there is laughing/giggling and ‘laughing/giggling’. There can be numerous reasons to laugh, which are difficult to understand by ‘outsiders’: Of course, autistic individuals laugh when they are happy , or if they find something funny. However, they often laugh to release fear, tension and anxiety . What is very difficult for their parents to comprehend (and accept) is that they might laugh or giggle non-stop when someone is crying. This may be one of their defensiv

Why can’t my child speak? It was estimated that about one third (Bryson 1996) to one half (Lord & Paul 1997) of autistic people never develop any functional speech: they are functionally mute. More recent research estimates of the proportion of children with ASD who have been classified as minimally verbal vary from 25% to 35%. What is it like not being able to talk? People who have never experienced this will go through life never knowing how soul crushing the condition of w

We assume that language is necessary verbal (i.e., comprising of words). That is why we say that children are verbal if they can talk (no matter that their verbal output is just a combination of echolalic phrases) and that they are non-verbal if they cannot produce verbal utterances. As the original experience of the world of autistic children is sensory-based, their original internal language (as a tool of formulation and expressing thoughts) consists of sensory-perceptual (

At about the same age all typically developing children, no matter what culture they are born into, manifest similar patterns of speech and language acquisition. In autism, however, there is no clear and rigid pattern during the first year, whereas in later years there appears a pattern typical for autistic children’s development (Saint-Georges et al. 2010). Crying as a ‘language’ Vocalization and babbling can be considered the earliest expression of language development (Che

According to some researchers (e.g., Ramachandran 1995), it is mirror neurons that allow us to "read" and understand another's intentions, and thus to develop a sophisticated "theory of other minds"; without these neurons, the child can no longer understand other people’s intentions, emotions and behaviours, and this is the case in autism. It is true that autistic people find it hard to perceive the mental states of others and it has been suggested that the central feature of

But do they? Giacomo Rizzollati and colleagues (1992) conducted experiments on monkeys, recording signals from parts of the frontal lobes which are concerned with motor commands. The researcher found that there are cells that fire not only when the monkey performs certain specific movements but also when the monkey watches another monkey performing the same action. ‘Monkey-see monkey-do neurons’ Rizzollati terms these neurons mirror neurons (‘monkey-see monkey-do neurons’). T

Can’t start – can’t stop Another problem autistic individuals experience is ‘inertia’ (Dekker 1999) – difficulty in starting, stopping, planning and changing activities. Initiation difficulties are often physical: despite knowing what to do (and how to do it), they just cannot start doing it. One of the possible causes can be an inability to control their bodies or other movement impairments . We don’t even have proper control of our bodies. Both staying still and moving whe

Autistic people are said to be (severely) impaired in their ability to empathise with other people which is reflected in the ‘mind-blindness theory’ of autism (Baron-Cohen, Leslie, Frith 1985; Frith 2003). However, contrary to the belief of lack of emotional compassion in autism, autistic individuals may experience enhanced emotionality (along with enhanced perception) (Markram et al . 2007). There are different types of empathy: sensory empathy, emotional (affective) empathy

It is not as simple as ABC When we come across a behaviour that’s difficult, there’s a popular method that’s used to help parents and carers to analyse what’s happening and do something about it. You may have heard about it – or even used it. It’s called the ABC approach the idea of which is that you find a trigger for the behaviour ( A ntecedent), define the B ehaviour and provide the ‘ C onsequence’ (for example, ignore/ time out) for this (often deemed ‘inappropriate’) beh

Thomas, a 12-year-old autistic boy has a long history of some features of anxiety and depression. For the past several months, he has been more anxious, sad, and easily overwhelmed. He seems irritable at home and school and cries often. He responds very slowly to the questions and often says "I don't know, I don't know," almost in an automatic way and he is now engaging in some repetitive hand movements which he had not done previously. He is no longer able to shower independ

Insisting on ‘Look at me when I’m talking to you’ vs. Talking to the wall Some autistic children need an intensive interaction style that make them aware of the presence of others and does not let them ‘slip’ into their own world – this is a directly-confrontational approach . For instance, for Temple Grandin, a more ‘intrusive’ style was beneficial as her sensory-perceptual problems were mild. For somebody with severe sensory distortions, a different approach is needed. They