Different Words for Autism Video Transcript

Hello. In this video we wanted to cover some of the many words and terms that you may have heard used in relation to autism.

 

In our service we usually use the term autism as an umbrella term for the wide range of presentations that we see in children diagnosed by our team.  

ASD, or Autism Spectrum Disorder, is the formal term that is still used in diagnostic manuals, along with autism.

As a team we use the criteria in these manuals when making diagnoses, and therefore you will see the term on your child’s assessment report, but we choose to use ‘autism’ and leave off the word ‘disorder’ where we can as we think it reflects better our understanding of autism as a difference, consisting of a combination of strengths as well as difficulties.

We used to use the term Autism Spectrum Condition as an alternative to Autism Spectrum Disorder to reflect the idea of a wide range of presentations consisting of strengths and difficulties. We no longer use this term, due to research showing that the majority of autistic adults prefer to be described simply as autistic.

The term Asperger’s or Asperger’s syndrome we are often asked about by parents. This is no longer a diagnosis which is given, but it was given for many years to describe a specific presentation within the autism spectrum. It was used to describe people who had autistic traits, but did not have a delay in their language development. They may have had some difficulties with the social use of language, but they did not have a core language need.

 

People with this presentation are now included under the broad umbrella of autism instead. This is because it was found that it was often difficult to separate out the two, and also some people may have had a language delay early on, but later catch up with their language to the point that, as adults, they would not present any differently to someone given the diagnosis of Asperger’s syndrome.

 

It is therefore more helpful to include everyone under the same umbrella. You may find things that were written at a time when Asperger’s was still given as a diagnosis and these may well still be relevant for your child, particularly if they have well developed language.

Finally, demand avoidance is a term that describes a particular pattern of behaviour within autism. Some children with autism may show a high level of resistance to demands or expectations placed on them, even when they have the language and understanding to make sense of what is being asked of them. This is understood to often be a reaction to a high level of anxiety that they may be experiencing, even if they do not necessarily seem outwardly anxious.

As well as official terms, there are many different ways that you may hear people referring to autism in every day speech. Different people have different views or opinions about which terms they prefer. There are no rights and wrongs about this, and sometimes people’s preferences change over time.

You may hear both “autistic people” and “people with autism” used and some people feel quite strongly about which term they prefer.
Those who prefer to be described as “autistic”, tend to argue that autism is part of who they are, rather than something separate to them, in the same way that we describe someone who is colour-blind or someone who is intelligent in this way, rather than saying they are someone “with colourblindness” or “with intelligence”.

Other people prefer to be described as “people with autism” because they feel their humanity and personhood is more important than their autism and so should come first. 

More recent research tends to show that many people prefer the term “autistic people”, so as a team we tend to use this term, in line with the National Autistic Society and NHS England.

You may have heard the terms “high-functioning” and “low-functioning” used to describe children’s needs. These were used more in the past, but we don’t use these anymore because they over simplify things and don’t capture the huge amount of individual variation that we see, which we will explain more about in another video.

You might commonly hear people say someone is “on the autism spectrum” or simply “on the spectrum”. We use this term quite a lot in our team, as it better reflects this huge variation and the fact that no two children are the same. 

Some people also use the term “neurodiversity” to describe the even wider range of diverse presentations and experiences of both autistic people and those with related conditions, such as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder or dyslexia.

Linked to this, the term “neurotypical” is sometimes used to describe people who are not autistic or not “neurodivergent”.

As we said, there is a wide range of views on this topic and there are no rights and wrongs. As a team we will try where possible to accommodate individual preferences when working with particular children, so please do discuss this with us if you feel strongly about which terms are used.

 

Thank you so much for taking the time to watch this video from the social communication team.

 

We really hope that you have found it useful.