kabouter wrote:
I am very disappointed with the article, I don't think it tells us anything new, and misleads people by suggesting that all autistics are visual thinkers.
I think you misinterpreted the article. It says that in autistic people "the area at the back of the brain, which processes visual information, is more highly developed." It doesn't say anything about visual thinking - it is talking about sensory sensitivity, not thinking style.
Even autistic people who don't think visually usually have enhanced sensitivity to visual stimulus - for example, sensitivity to light, fascination with the appearance of objects or parts of objects, close attention to visual detail, and tendency for the eye to pick out interruptions in patterns (in my case, I'm sensitive to visual "noise" as well, though this seems to be less common). Although they use an example of an artist in the video (which personally really pleases me because there's still a myth that autistic people aren't creative or artistic which is completely false), this applies just as much to autistic people who are more science or maths oriented or who have different thinking styles, and I agree with them that enhanced sensitivity to visual stimulus probably applies across almost all of the autistic spectrum.
In terms of professionals having better understanding of our sensory experience, it's great that they have been able to show this conclusively.