The diagnostic code for autism spectrum disorder.
The thing is, it reads like two separate disorders stuck together. I'm not convinced they can't occur separately (except in the sense that narrow and repetitive interests will have an effect on your social communication); the confidence they have for doing this is I think unwarranted, and based on the idea that because autism *must* be a thing, these *must* be linked.
If I was doing it, I would at least have strongly considered splitting it into two -- say, Social Communication/Interaction Disorder (and rename the existing one back to an actually relevant title that makes it clear it has something to do with language -- names should mean something), and... Hyperattentivity Disorder? Because I can see people slipping through the cracks here, because they aren't sufficiently impaired in one of these areas. Sure, it would upset the people who have built their careers on 'Autism' to suddenly find it no longer exists, but categories have to continually prove their use, and ought to be dropped if they do not.
And I would drop the "atypical or excessive for the individual’s age and sociocultural context." If autism is something, it is not a culture bound disorder. It should not be possible to 'cure' someone by moving them to a different context like this.
01 Apr 2022, 1:18 pm
