Autism ADHD and ethnic diversity?

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I developed this theory from my own personal experiences with Autism and ADHD. I have been diagnosed with both ADHD and Autism Spectrum Disorder in my mid twenties. I was unaware I had Autism but was sure I had ADHD, well Attention deficit disorder without the hyperactivity anyway. So I went through the doctor and ended up getting diagnosed with both. I believe my sister also has the same form of autism. I also believe my mother has ADHD. My mothers mother is from Southern Italy and my mothers father is English a Nordic European. I believe that it is this mixing of ethnicities by my grandparents that gave my mother ADHD which was then passed down to me and I believe my autism was passed down to me through this but like genetic conditions do it skipped a generation missing my mother and effecting me. Of course I accept this is just a personal view.

What do you think about this theory?

I have a website detailing my theory if you want to know the web address please email me and i'll send it to you as i cant put up links on this forum

Thanks

Autism and ADHD are genetic, although there are a few environmental factors that can produce similar symptoms (e.g. foetal alcohol syndrome produces some ADHD-like symptoms).

Autism is extremely rare in African populations, except for in those who have ancestors of European or Asian origin. ADHD does occur but due to the fact that many Africans do manual labour rather than office work which requires concentration -- and with plenty of exercise being good for ADHD -- and with children playing energetic games and getting a high level of thrill -- the detrimental effects of ADHD are not always quite so bad.

In my own experience northern Europeans and Semitic populations, as well as some from the far east, have a higher incidence of autism than other Indo-Europeans, but I have no scientific evidence about the statistics to back up this observation.

I have northern and western European ancestors, and probably one or two distant ancestors from India about 7 generations back.

Mixing races tends to mean fewer genetic issues for the offspring because the same traits tend to concentrate in the same gene pools--for example, blond hair is much more likely in Germany than in China; and people from some parts of Africa tend to have a distinctive very curly texture to their hair. That's because they've been in the same area, reproducing within the same group, and have selected out the most useful genes, thereby making their gene pool smaller.

Some genes that create disability, genetic illness, or vulnerabilities to various conditions, are recessive. That means that you need a matched pair to express the trait at all, because if you have one normal gene, it covers for the abnormal one it's matched with. Others are partly dominant, so that if you have one gene, you end up with a milder version of the trait, whereas if you have two, you get a strong version. (There's also the way they combine and the way they switch each other on or off, but that gets complicated.)

Anyway, if you have two parents from two different areas, they probably have genes that are more different from each other than if they were from the same area. You are more likely to get different copies of a gene than you are to get a matched pair, one from each parent. The offspring tends to have fewer genetic problems because, if he got a lot of matched pairs, he'd have higher odds of getting a genetic condition that would otherwise be covered for by the other gene in an unmatched pair.

There's actually one theory that suggests that Asperger Syndrome was passed on to us through Neanderthal ancestors which interbred with Cro-Magnons, while people of pure Cro-Magnon stock (such as Africans) are never aspies. The theory also suggests that some of the characteristics which Neanderthals had are typical aspie characteristics... but of course there are also other theories about Neanderthals which suggest they were monstrous and violent cannibals, which doesn't sound very aspie to me!

Callista's right -- genetic diversity reduces rather than increases the odds of an anomalous phenotype. I have one kid with ADHD and another with autism, and they come from a very homogeneous northern European background on both sides.

I was diagnosed with high functioning autism and I was told my ADHD symptoms are a result of the autism. I'm from Ireland and my country happens to have a higher rate of autism than usual. In my town you can barely walk down the road without running into an autistic person, I mean proper autistic not aspergers or high functioning autism. 1 guy walks into my front garden every day, straightens the doormat, walks out, closes the gate and continues on his way.

email me and i'll tell you my web address i have a bit of evdence to back up my claim. its interesting stuff

Harper & Williams (1976): "In a survey on the occurrence of infantile autism in New South Wales it was found that 21-9% of children had at least one foreign-born parent whose native language was not English."

Gillberg et al. (1987): "Urban children with autism more often than age-matched children in the general population had immigrant parents from 'exotic' countries."

Gillberg et al. (1995): "The prevalence for autistic disorder in Göteborg children born to mothers who were born in Uganda was 15% which is almost 200 times higher than in the general population of children."

Gillberg & Gillberg (1996): "Fifteen of these children (27%) were born to parents, at least one of whom had migrated to Sweden."

Bernard-Opitz et al. (2001): "Discussion focuses on possible risk factors and psychosocial adversities for autism such as a high frequency of caregivers who are foreign maids, the use of multiple languages and the high level of punitive educational practices."

Lauritsen et al. (2005): "An increased relative risk of 1.4 was found if the mother was born outside Europe, and in children of parents who were born in different countries."

Maimburg and Vaeth (2006): "The risk of infantile autism was increased for mothers aged >35 years, with foreign citizenship, and mothers who used medicine during pregnancy."

Kolevzon et al. (2007): "The parental characteristics associated with an increased risk of autism and autism spectrum disorders included advanced maternal age, advanced paternal age, and maternal place of birth outside Europe or North America."


How do you guys and girls expalin the above quotes by autism experts?

children of immigrant especially where one of the parents has come from outsifde europe or north america?

What is your take on this?