"How People with Autism Forge Friendships"

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02 Feb 2023, 6:35 pm

Scientific American, attributed to Spectrum: "How People with Autism Forge Friendships"

Quote:
From the very first recorded cases of autism, scientists have recognized that a lack of social interaction is a central part of the condition. In his 1943 paper, Leo Kanner described one autistic girl who moved among other children “like a strange being, as one moves between the pieces of furniture.” He interpreted the behavior of autistic children as being governed by “the powerful desire for aloneness and sameness.” For decades after, scientists and clinicians supposed that people with autism do not have friends and are not interested in forging friendships. “Until recently, there was an assumption that we would have found that the number [of friends] was zero,” says Matthew Lerner, a psychologist at Stony Brook University in New York.

A new line of research is forcing a rethink of those long-held beliefs. Autistic people overwhelmingly report that they want friends. And they have shown that they can and do form friendships with both neurotypical and autistic peers, even if their interactions sometimes look different from those among neurotypical people. This reframed view of friendship aims to acknowledge and encourage a better understanding of the social lives of autistic people. It recognizes the challenges autistic people face in creating close relationships, including difficulties in processing social information and dealing with conflict. “Nothing is impossible in terms of friendships for people with autism,” Lerner says, “but it does perhaps take a different route.”


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When diagnosed I bought champagne!
I finally knew why people were strange.