Asd Stereotypes

Within our culture there are too many stereotypes associated with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). The aim of this essay is to find out what are the most common stereotypes and why these stereotypes exist in our society, what has led society to believe them. In the UK, there are over 700,000 people with ASD, (National Autistic Society- What is autism) despite the large number of people with ASD, Autism is still a widely misunderstood condition and that is how so many stereotypes have emerged.

ASD is a lifelong neurological disorder, it is characterised by marked difficulties in three main areas: social interaction, social communication and social imagination- these areas are mainly known as the triad of impairments associated with ASD. ‘’ …show more content…
The main stereotype is: People with autism have ‘savant abilities’ (mentioned above). ‘Savant abilities’ refer to individuals with autism who have extraordinary skills that many people don’t have, an example of this is an autistic with artistic abilities can look at a building and draw it from memory. (Ph.D. S. M., Research: Autistic Savants) Not every person with autism has a ‘savant ability’, however it was revealed that only 10% of people with autism have ‘savant abilities’. (Ph.D. S. M., Research: Autistic Savants).This stereotype mainly stems from the very popular 1988 film Rain Man. In the film Raymond showed to have amazing memory skills as he was able to remember ball player statistics, memorise counted cards in Las Vegas and memorise certain parts of the telephone book. The film gave millions of people worldwide an insight into autism and the ‘autistic savant’ phenomenon, however, after the film’s release many people believed that every person with autism has ‘savant abilities’ (Ph.D. S. M., Research: Autistic …show more content…
This stereotype is simply not true. Autism affects both male and females, however, the reason why so many people are led to believe that autism affects males more than females is down to research, the media, tv shows. Research shows that boys are four times more likely to be diagnosed with Autism (Fombonne, 2003, 2005). However, there is evidence to prove that females with ASD are diagnosed later in life (Begeer et al., 2013; Giarelli et al., 2010), this clearly highlights that some females with ASD are missed at an early age and that their ASD is picked up on at a later stage in their life. It has been speculated that some females with ASD are better at masking their symptoms in order to fit in with society’s expectations on how women should be and behave. (The National Autistic Society - What is gender?). The majority of research findings associated with ASD has heavily focused on male characteristics which results in less research regarding the needs of females with ASD (Ernsperger, Lori Ph.D, BCBA-D – Girls and women on the Autism spectrum)“The underdiagnosing of women with ASD contributes to the marginalization of females” (Kearns-Miller, 2003). Television programs can also contribute to the stereotype; autism affects more males than females because on many programs aired on television which focus on Autism Spectrum Disorder have a male lead, it’s very rare to see a female as the lead actress,

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