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Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.

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Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you welcome to Stuff Mom Never Told You?

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Speaker 1: From House top works dot Com. Hello, and welcome to

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Speaker 1: the podcast. I'm Kristen, I'm Molly Smolly Here at Stuff

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Speaker 1: I've Never told you a lot of times we talked

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Speaker 1: about women's specific health issues, and this time we're gonna

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Speaker 1: take a little different tech with that because we're talking

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Speaker 1: about autism today, and generally speaking, autism an autism spectrum

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Speaker 1: of disorders is considered much more of a boy's problem

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Speaker 1: than a girl's problem. The statistics that's often thrown out

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Speaker 1: is that boys are four times more likely to be

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Speaker 1: diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder than girls. So we

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Speaker 1: wanted to look at why is this? Why are girls

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Speaker 1: under diagnosed? Because there are girls who have been diagnosed

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Speaker 1: with autism, aspergers, etcetera. UM, but a lot of the

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Speaker 1: coverage that you see is really dealing you know, treated

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Speaker 1: as something as a male epidemic, and there are some

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Speaker 1: researchers who are saying that's really harming girls who aren't

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Speaker 1: getting a diagnosis that they need. So before we dive

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Speaker 1: into it, perhaps we should give a little bit of

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Speaker 1: an overview about autism. We're probably not going to cover

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Speaker 1: everything that you know, parents and interested persons out there

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Speaker 1: interested in It's a big topic, can be very controversial topic.

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Speaker 1: We're gonna kind of give you a little bit of

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Speaker 1: an overview that serves the needs for what we're gonna

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Speaker 1: talk about later. Yeah. Autism is a complex neurobiological disorder

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Speaker 1: of development that lasts through a person's lifetime. There are

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Speaker 1: three main categories within the autism spectrum disorders, and that

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Speaker 1: includes autistic disorder which is also called classic autism, Asperger syndrome,

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Speaker 1: which you'll often here refer to as high functioning autism now,

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Speaker 1: and also pervasive developmental disorder not otherwise specified or atypical

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Speaker 1: autism now. The reason that there are so many categories

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Speaker 1: is that symptoms really manifest themselves in different ways, which

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Speaker 1: is why autism is considered to have this spectrum. You know,

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Speaker 1: it can be at one end and be, as Christen said,

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Speaker 1: very high functioning, and then you can be on the

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Speaker 1: other end of a spectrum and be sort of this

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Speaker 1: class classical example of someone who doesn't speak, doesn't make

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Speaker 1: eye contact, doesn't really engage in social activity, and even

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Speaker 1: though referring to the spectrum as sort of the the

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Speaker 1: acknowledge way to go, we're kind of going to talk

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Speaker 1: about autism just as a unit in this podcast, but

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Speaker 1: please know that we are aware that it is a spectrum.

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Speaker 1: Not every case of autism is the same, but there

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Speaker 1: are a few UM signs and symptoms that kind of

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Speaker 1: mark the condition, the main one being the thing we

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Speaker 1: talked about with UH communication it's usually not as strong.

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Speaker 1: One of the main one being communication where people with

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Speaker 1: aoughtist immediately lacked the ability to communicate with their peers

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Speaker 1: and those around them. Social interactions where they UH may

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Speaker 1: not interact and show emotion in the way that their

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Speaker 1: children do, may not demonstrate empathy and understanding what other

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Speaker 1: people are thinking. And stereotyped behaviors which is sort of

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Speaker 1: a repetitive behavior, obsession with certain toys, obsession with certain

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Speaker 1: activities like counting, singing, repeating certain senses over and over again,

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Speaker 1: um my, living out christ One else do you think

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Speaker 1: is sort of a case of stereotypical red flags for autism? Well,

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Speaker 1: I'm ill. According to the National Institutes of Health UM,

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Speaker 1: there are lots of different red flags, including poor eye contact,

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Speaker 1: child doesn't smile when smiled at, UM, doesn't really understand

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Speaker 1: how to play with toys, UM, child throws intense or

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Speaker 1: violent tantrum's uh, and might be nonverbal. Like you mentioned, UM,

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Speaker 1: the child might spend a lot of time lining things

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Speaker 1: up or putting things in a certain order. So, as

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Speaker 1: you can see, there are a ton of different UM

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Speaker 1: quote unquote red flags for UH specific types of autistic behavior.

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Speaker 1: But the big mystery that scientists and medical researchers have

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Speaker 1: yet to solve is why children develop autistic UH disorders

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Speaker 1: in the first place. Is it genes, is it environmental factors? Really?

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Speaker 1: Why why does this happen? And then there's the question

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Speaker 1: of why does this happen more often too? Boys? As

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Speaker 1: Kristen said, four times more often. And there was an

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Speaker 1: article in Time last year about genetic clues as to

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Speaker 1: why boys might be more susceptible to autism. UH. They

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Speaker 1: found this gene identified as c A c N A

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Speaker 1: one g and it's more common in boys. So if

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Speaker 1: you're looking for a gene that seems to activate these

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Speaker 1: sort of responses or to you know, turn off something

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Speaker 1: else that uh, you know, may prevent autism, this gene

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Speaker 1: is sort of the one clue they have that, you know,

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Speaker 1: they call it an autism hotspot basically, And this gene

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Speaker 1: sits on chromosome seven teene, which is surrounded by other

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Speaker 1: genes which have also been linked to autism. But this

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Speaker 1: specific gene is responsible for regulating the flow of calcium

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Speaker 1: into and out of cells, and that influences um activation

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Speaker 1: of nerve cells in the brain, which is relevant because

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Speaker 1: some researchers think that autism is really um sort of

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Speaker 1: a an issue of overactive nerves. So now, according to

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Speaker 1: his researchers, nearly of the general population has a very

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Speaker 1: common form of this gene, but there's a variant of

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Speaker 1: genes that's pretty prevalent and autistic boys. And the fact

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Speaker 1: that matters is there probably is not just one gene

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Speaker 1: that causes autism. It's probably a combination of genes. And

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Speaker 1: so it's impossible to say that just because boys have

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Speaker 1: this one gene that that totally explains why boys receive

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Speaker 1: a diagnosis more but there is, like Christians at the

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Speaker 1: very beginning, this perception that autism is a boy's disease.

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Speaker 1: In fact, it's some times called a problem of an

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Speaker 1: extreme male brain, and that is by researcher Simon Barren Cohen.

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Speaker 1: And I think that it almost sort of to understand

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Speaker 1: barren Cohen's theory, you've got to kind of buy into

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Speaker 1: the most base of gender stereotypes. So Barren Cohen really

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Speaker 1: divides men and women up into empathizers and systemizers, and

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Speaker 1: not surprisingly, women are considered more empathizing in that we

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Speaker 1: enjoy more verbal communication. Um, we tend to pick up

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Speaker 1: on social cues quicker than men might. We involve, we

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Speaker 1: enjoy you know, richer social interactions with people around us,

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Speaker 1: whereas men tend toward the tend to be systemizers, and

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Speaker 1: that they for instance, gravitate more towards engineering and mathematics

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Speaker 1: and fields that really deal with um, ordering the systems

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Speaker 1: around them, ordering different things. And just think about all

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Speaker 1: legos are a boy a boy's toy. Like when I

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Speaker 1: say it's gender stereotypes, it's it's almost like every conflict

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Speaker 1: that you could think of between a man and a

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Speaker 1: woman in sort of a in sort of a stereotypical

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Speaker 1: rom com, like the woman complaining that the guy won't

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Speaker 1: talk to her, won't look around the eye, whereas the

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Speaker 1: guy just like wants to build a model jet to

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Speaker 1: take it to a really far extreme. But Baron Cohen

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Speaker 1: is saying that you know, these differences between the genders

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Speaker 1: are there, and they affect our brain, and if you

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Speaker 1: are too far on a systematizing scale, then you have autism. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: He basically says that children with autism are extreme system

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Speaker 1: izers and that they are so focused kind of on

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Speaker 1: on ordering the world around them that they that they

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Speaker 1: lack empathy. They don't pick up on you know, like

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Speaker 1: one of the red flags I mentioned was, you know,

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Speaker 1: a child doesn't smile back if you smile at him

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Speaker 1: or her, and um, you know it doesn't. People with

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Speaker 1: autism just might not pick up on those um social cues.

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Speaker 1: And Baron Cohen says that, um, people with autistic disorders

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Speaker 1: lack a quote theory of the mind, which is basically

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Speaker 1: um the idea that people have thoughts and intentions that

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Speaker 1: might differ from your own. I mean, it's through the

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Speaker 1: mind is basically, you know, a fancy way to discuss empathy. Right.

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Speaker 1: So he has done surveys where he's found that women

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Speaker 1: do tend to, you know, have more empathizing traits, men

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Speaker 1: tend to have the systemizing traits, and autistic people be

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Speaker 1: they women or men, tend to be systemizers as well.

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Speaker 1: So that's how he's come up with the idea that

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Speaker 1: autism is the extreme male mind. Now he's also doing

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Speaker 1: this study where he's saying that an excess of testosterone

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Speaker 1: in the womb, which boys receive, maybe the reason that

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Speaker 1: autism occurs. This is where Baron Cohen I think gets

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Speaker 1: into a little bit of trouble because his thing is

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Speaker 1: sort of to take very small studies and make very

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Speaker 1: grand pronouncements. As a Psychology Today article put it into

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Speaker 1: thous and for and so we're not saying that Baron

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Speaker 1: cone is without his critics, but he's saying that when

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Speaker 1: boys get that excess of testosterone and then they tend

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Speaker 1: to have autism after that, that perhaps there's a link there.

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Speaker 1: But he stills to do studies where he compares, you know,

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Speaker 1: how much testosterone boy got in the womb who didn't

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Speaker 1: develop autism versus one who did. So he stills a

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Speaker 1: lot of work to do. But I think that one

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Speaker 1: of the reasons it's valuable to talk about him is

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Speaker 1: because he was I think one of the first to

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Speaker 1: really look at autism and make it a gender issue.

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Speaker 1: And since autism has been classified as such a male affliction,

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Speaker 1: if you will. It has been really hard for parents

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Speaker 1: UM to get diagnoses for their autistic diagnosis for their

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Speaker 1: for their daughters because a lot of times UM doctors

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Speaker 1: just do not associate autism with with girls, and research

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Speaker 1: even suggests that girls who are screened for autistic traits

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Speaker 1: might not even be classified as autistic. For instance, there's

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Speaker 1: one study of sixty patients at a psychiatric hospital in

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Speaker 1: England and none of those were diagnosed as autistic, but

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Speaker 1: eleven were later shown to have autistic traits. Instead, these

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Speaker 1: girls were diagnosed with other conditions such as personality disorder

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Speaker 1: and schizophrenia. And an interesting thing when we're talking about

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Speaker 1: girls and autism UM is that they've also found a

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Speaker 1: link between autism and eating disorders and girls, which actually

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Speaker 1: kind of makes sense. We didn't bring this up in

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Speaker 1: our podcast on eating disorders that we did a little

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Speaker 1: while ago, but when you think about it in terms

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Speaker 1: of systemizing your environment and sort of the control aspects

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Speaker 1: that are involved with anorexia and bolimia and other types

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Speaker 1: of eating disorders, it does kind of make sense. And

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Speaker 1: this was a topic of conversation, this link between eating

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Speaker 1: disorders and autism at a conference once are the first

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Speaker 1: of its kind that was sponsored by a charity called

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Speaker 1: Research Autism to kind of get into uh, these these

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Speaker 1: differences between boys and girls when it comes to autism.

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Speaker 1: So to give you a little bit more idea of

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Speaker 1: this being disorder an autism link, uh, antorexty has actually

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Speaker 1: been called the female Aspergers and that you know, it's

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Speaker 1: got sort of this as Christmas saying this rigid perfectionist

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Speaker 1: ideal of systematizing the world. And they were saying that

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Speaker 1: first people with autism are more risk of getting intorexty

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Speaker 1: because they are obsessed with those symptoms. And then two,

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Speaker 1: once you actually start to lose the weight, if that's

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Speaker 1: you know how the young start to manifests itself. Being

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Speaker 1: underweight kind of exaggerates the autistic traits in that, you know,

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Speaker 1: the lack of food is affecting your brain, and you're

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Speaker 1: not able to control that social behavior the way you

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Speaker 1: might have otherwise, and you are seeming more withdrawn. You

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Speaker 1: lack that ability to have empathy, and the fact that um,

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Speaker 1: it takes being a little bit starved to have that

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Speaker 1: come out kind of gets the heart of one of

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Speaker 1: these differences. These these main differences between autism girls and

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Speaker 1: autism and boys, because one of the reasons that researchers

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Speaker 1: think that autism might be under diagnosed is because girls

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Speaker 1: are much better at mimicking the social interactions of those

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Speaker 1: around them than boys are. So Christina is talking about

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Speaker 1: how autism is usually diagnosed to age three. Autism tends

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Speaker 1: to be diagnosed later on for girls because at age three,

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Speaker 1: they tend to be more inherently, you know, they can

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Speaker 1: somehow mimic what they need to mimic. They're a little

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Speaker 1: bit more verbal already, so that's sort of, Um, the

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Speaker 1: first part of the issue is as Christmas saying, these

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Speaker 1: these girls are getting the right checkbox marked office one

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Speaker 1: doctor put it, but they're still not getting the correct diagnosis.

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Speaker 1: And I think that it also reflections basics differences between

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Speaker 1: very young boys and very young girls are socialized. Um,

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Speaker 1: you know, I think a lot of times, uh, girls

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Speaker 1: are raised to be more vocal and um, maybe just

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Speaker 1: have more of a chance to you kind of learn

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Speaker 1: those like quote unquote normalized behaviors as opposed to boys

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Speaker 1: where you know, like it's fine if they just want

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Speaker 1: to go off and play with their tanks by themselves

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Speaker 1: and play video games for all hours of the day.

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Speaker 1: Whereas you know, we expect, we expect little girls to

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Speaker 1: be you know, smiling and sweet and and talkative, and

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Speaker 1: so the girls learn how to do that, but the

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Speaker 1: problem really seems to come later for them in middle school,

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Speaker 1: where you know, think about middle school bullies for example,

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Speaker 1: this was one thing that one or one of our

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Speaker 1: articles brought up. To bully someone, you really have to

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Speaker 1: know how they feel so you can exploit it. And

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Speaker 1: if you have, if you lack that theory of mind,

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Speaker 1: then you can't do that. So they're saying that it's

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Speaker 1: really middle school when those uh, female relationships get so

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Speaker 1: tricky that parents realize there's something wrong with my daughter

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Speaker 1: because she doesn't interact with other children the way I

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Speaker 1: expect her to. And it's interesting because it seems like,

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Speaker 1: you know, going back to this empathizer versus systemized or

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Speaker 1: Barren Cohen theory, Um, it seems like you know autistic

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Speaker 1: girls while you know, according to Barren Cohen, you know

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Speaker 1: have these extreme male brains. But I would argue that, um,

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Speaker 1: you know, these girls still have more of an ability

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Speaker 1: to empathize, if you will, than autistic boys because it

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Speaker 1: seems like they take to heart UM being socially ostracized

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Speaker 1: a lot more than the boys do. UM. There is

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Speaker 1: paper by two researchers that pointed out that even though

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Speaker 1: UM females are way under diagnosed with autism, they still

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Speaker 1: make up half the autistic patients with mood disorders UM.

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Speaker 1: So it seems like there's a there's a much stronger

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Speaker 1: connection between female autism and females and anxiety as as

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Speaker 1: opposed to UM autism in males, right because they've always

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Speaker 1: thought of autism is such this male condition. The research

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Speaker 1: of autism and girls lags years behind, and so they

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Speaker 1: are just now coming out and realizing that you can

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Speaker 1: be sort of empathetic as a girl and still have

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Speaker 1: autism because there is that link. As Kristen said of

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Speaker 1: the depression anxiety, girls are realizing that they don't fit in,

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Speaker 1: they can't necessarily control why they don't, and that they

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Speaker 1: can't change their interactions with people, but they know that

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Speaker 1: they are different, which then leads to that sort of anxiety,

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Speaker 1: that depression. And there's an indication according to some research,

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Speaker 1: you know, maybe maybe a bit more anecdotal, that autistic

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Speaker 1: boys realize that they're different and just don't care, whereas

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Speaker 1: the girls you know still have that that desire to

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Speaker 1: fit in and it affects them more strongly. Yeah, just

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Speaker 1: to give you an idea of some of the research

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Speaker 1: UM in this field, A group of German researchers UM

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Speaker 1: published a study in May comparing twenty three high functioning

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Speaker 1: autistic girls with twenty three high functioning boys between the

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Speaker 1: ages of five and twenty, matching them for AG i

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Speaker 1: Q and autism DIAG. Nurses and the parents among this

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Speaker 1: very you know, similar similar group UM parents reported more

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Speaker 1: problems for girls involving pure relations, maturity, social independence, and attention.

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Speaker 1: And by and large, UM, over and over again, you

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Speaker 1: see autistic girls having more trouble within their social networks

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Speaker 1: if they're having these communication and language problems compared to boys.

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Speaker 1: And I would say that, you know, part of it,

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Speaker 1: UM would go back to just social expectations. You know,

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Speaker 1: girls are just expected to be more I guess girls

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Speaker 1: are expected to be friendly or maybe than boys are.

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Speaker 1: And uh, and not to mention, I mean if you're

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Speaker 1: if you're diagnosis is emerging in adolescent years, I mean

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Speaker 1: that's a that's a hard enough time as it is right,

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Speaker 1: let's talk about another difference between autism and males and females.

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Speaker 1: There was this New York Times article by Emily Basilon

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Speaker 1: Uh and she writes about, how, you know, we tend

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Speaker 1: to think of autism as this condition where the people

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Speaker 1: lack verbal ability. They really can't speak with us, they

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Speaker 1: may not be able to communicate. And most of the

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Speaker 1: girls she met with autism were We're great with language.

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Speaker 1: They loved to read, they love to write, whereas that's

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Speaker 1: not something we associate with with boys and autism. And

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Speaker 1: so it's it's just another difference that you may not

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Speaker 1: be looking for when you're trying to consider whether you know,

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Speaker 1: this is what's going on with your kids or what's

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Speaker 1: going on with you, and that you know they can

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Speaker 1: be verbal, they can't express themselves, but just it's not

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Speaker 1: what you'd expect from someone with this condition. Well, and

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Speaker 1: we're talking a lot about more of the behavioral symptoms

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Speaker 1: and different expectations for boys and girls. But the Basilon

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Speaker 1: article also goes back to the genes that we were

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Speaker 1: talking about earlier, UM and she points out that there

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Speaker 1: have been two major genetic linkage studies that have come

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Speaker 1: out recently that have really underscored the fact that UM,

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Speaker 1: there might be different genes responsible for autism in boys

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Speaker 1: and girls. Like in the Time magazine article, the gene

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Speaker 1: was really male specific. I mean, the study group was

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Speaker 1: focused on families with at least one son who was

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Speaker 1: autistic UM, Whereas there might be a completely different UM

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Speaker 1: autistic prone autism prone gene that expresses itself in girls,

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Speaker 1: which might also contribute to this gap, this gender gap.

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Speaker 1: And you know, as we said there, it's just there're

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Speaker 1: years behind in the research because it has been thought

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Speaker 1: of it such a male condition. It's hard for the

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Speaker 1: girls to get a diagnosis when that's really what they need.

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Speaker 1: And as a result, a lot of these treatments that

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Speaker 1: are out there are not very girl friendly, I guess,

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Speaker 1: for lack of a better word. Many of the drugs

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Speaker 1: that people give to kids with autism haven't been tested

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Speaker 1: on girls. And the New York Times article that I

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Speaker 1: mentioned talks about how you know if you're if you're

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Speaker 1: putting your child in a school for autistic children are

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Speaker 1: kids on a spectrum. The girls go there and they

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Speaker 1: don't have any any other girls to talk to you.

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Speaker 1: They are around boys all the time. And because this

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Speaker 1: condition manifests itself so differently in the two genders, it

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Speaker 1: really kind of hurts them socially, which just exacerbates that

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Speaker 1: anxiety they feel at being different. So we have a

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Speaker 1: ton of different reasons why autism is diagnosed far more

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Speaker 1: in boys than in girls. UM, although it doesn't necessarily

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Speaker 1: mean that autism doesn't affect girls as much, it's just

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Speaker 1: a lot harder for girls to get the get that diagnosis. UM.

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Speaker 1: So now it's time that we want to hear from

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Speaker 1: you guys if y'all have any experience, um with autism. Um,

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Speaker 1: you know girls out there who have struggled these behaviors. Um.

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Speaker 1: One of the articles we uh ran across mentioned that

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Speaker 1: there have been there's a growing number of adult women

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Speaker 1: who are coming around to realizing that, hey, these would

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Speaker 1: be like hive functioning autistic women who are realizing that

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Speaker 1: they have to have some of the classic symptoms. That

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Speaker 1: sort of explains what's been going on for a long time. UM.

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Speaker 1: So yeah, let us let us know your thoughts on

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Speaker 1: the topic. Mom stuff at house stuff works dot com

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Speaker 1: and is their email address? And speaking of which, let's

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Speaker 1: read a little email. All right, I'm gonna start off

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Speaker 1: with one from Karen. It's about our podcast on women

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Speaker 1: and Freemasonry. She writes, because she was part of a

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Speaker 1: Masonic group from ages eleven to eighteen, I as a

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Speaker 1: member of the International Order of Job's Daughters, a group

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Speaker 1: of young girls who are descendants of Freemasons. Job Daughters

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Speaker 1: is based on the Masonic Order, so each gathering of

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Speaker 1: Job's Daughters in a given city has officers with different rankings.

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Speaker 1: There are weekly meanings that are secret, as well as

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Speaker 1: many social events, some of which are open to friends

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Speaker 1: and family. Girls can move up the rankings to be

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Speaker 1: the Honored Queen, which is the highest office. Yeah, she writes,

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Speaker 1: I have mixed feelings about my time as a Job's Daughter.

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Speaker 1: On one hand, I feel that it promotes many positive

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Speaker 1: things such as leadership, responsibility, sisterhood at cetera. And some

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Speaker 1: of my fondest memories of my teenage years were from

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Speaker 1: spending time with my friends at Job's Daughter's events. However,

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Speaker 1: looking back, I think it repetuates some anequated female gender

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Speaker 1: roles by not allowing any women present at official events

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Speaker 1: to wear pants. That's right. We had to wear skirts

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Speaker 1: or dresses and usually slips in hosury all the time,

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Speaker 1: unless you were having a sleepover or something very casual

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Speaker 1: like that. At this point, I don't think I would

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Speaker 1: encourage any girl to join Job's Daughters, but ultimately feel

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Speaker 1: that it had a positive impact. At this point, I

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Speaker 1: don't think that I've encouraged any girl to join Job's Daughters,

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Speaker 1: but i altio I feel like that it had a

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Speaker 1: positive impact that outweighed everything else for me. Job's Daughters

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Speaker 1: has secrets just like the Mason's. But the thing is,

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Speaker 1: none of these secrets are remotely interesting. Sad to find out.

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Speaker 1: Kind of got a similar response from Meg, who is

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Speaker 1: the wife of a freemason, and she says that she

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Speaker 1: and her husband have been together for four years. When

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Speaker 1: she first learned he was a Mason, she was very

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Speaker 1: bothered by it. However, now that I've gone to know

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Speaker 1: him and some of his brothers in the lodge, I

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Speaker 1: can say that it's completely harmless. The biggest secret and

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Speaker 1: freemasonry is how much the tuna cost for dinner that night.

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Speaker 1: As far as I can tell, they spent a lot

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Speaker 1: of time talking about money, budgets and what charity needs

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Speaker 1: um they're helping that day. All in all, I think

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Speaker 1: it sounds very boring, but it makes my husband happy,

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Speaker 1: and he's made a lot of great friends through freemasonry. Also,

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Speaker 1: when he dies, the members of his lodge will take

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Speaker 1: care of me as his widow. In any way I

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Speaker 1: need be a painting the house, yard work, or just

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Speaker 1: to drive to the doctor when I'm old. I say,

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Speaker 1: let the boys have their boys only club. It's not

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Speaker 1: harming anyone, and in fact, they do a lot of good.

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Speaker 1: I feel that Freemasons are misjudge just saying a lot,

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Speaker 1: because if I had been writing this four years ago,

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Speaker 1: I'd have a whole bunch of conspiracy theories for you.

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Speaker 1: So thanks Meg for the inside scoop, And if you

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Speaker 1: would like to email us again, our email addresses Mom's

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Speaker 1: Stuff and how stuff Works dot com. And you should

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Speaker 1: become a fan of us on Facebook look for us there,

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Speaker 1: and you should also follow us on Twitter. We have

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Speaker 1: an account there and it is Mom's Stuff podcast. And finally,

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Speaker 1: you should check out our blog we update regularly during

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Speaker 1: the week, which you can find on how stuff works

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Speaker 1: dot com. For more on this and thousands of other topics,

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Speaker 1: visit how stuff works dot com. Want more how stuff works,

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Speaker 1: check out our blogs on the house stuff works dot

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Speaker 1: Com home page, brought to you by the reinvented two

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Speaker 1: thousand twelve camera. It's ready, are you