6:11pm June 22, 2014

➸ Enhanced Perceptual Functioning in Autism: An Update, and Eight Principles of Autistic Perception

neurodiversitysci:

youneedacat:

neurodiversitysci:

chordatesrock:

alwaysfaithfulterriblelizard:

youneedacat:

Abstract: We propose an ‘‘Enhanced Perceptual Functioning’’ model encompassing the main diﬀerences between autistic and non-autistic social and non-social perceptual processing: locally oriented visual and auditory perception, enhanced low-level discrimination, use of a more posterior network in ‘‘complex’’ visual tasks, enhanced perception of ﬁrst order static stimuli, diminished perception of complex movement, autonomy of low-level information processing toward higher-order operations, and differential relation between perception and general intelligence. Increased perceptual expertise may be implicated in the choice of special ability in savant autistics, and in the variability of apparent presentations within PDD (autism with and without typical speech, Asperger syndrome) in non-savant autistics. The overfunctioning of brain regions typically involved in primary perceptual functions may explain the autistic perceptual endophenotype.

This article is well worth reading if you can figure out a way to read through all the academic jargon. I can’t 100% understand it and I’ve read it over and over again throughout the years, but it’s still the best explanation of autism (including many things not explained any other way) I’ve ever read through actual researchers. And it makes more sense to me than a lot of more popularized theories that are easier to communicate about, but incorporate less of the research literature into their explanations of things. The above link is a PDF file. And warning that it’s not easy going, reading-wise, at all, but if you can slog through even a little of it, it’s worth it. It explains things (including seeming “discrepancies” in research) that other theories simply don’t explain at all and don’t even try to explain. And most notably for some people here, it makes the case that social skills aren’t the fundamental difference between autistic and nonautistic people at all. Autistic people interested in theories of autism at all should try to become as familiar with Enhanced Perceptual Functioning as they are with “intense world theory” and the like — more so, if possible, although again it’s harder because EPF is written in the language of research and IWT is usually written for popular audiences. Ideally, someone who can easily read this kind of jargon could help translate papers like this for the rest of us, but I don’t know if that’s going to happen.

i got a translation up to the second principle, and then i needed to take a break. i’m going to try and finish this sometime soon, it’s really interesting!

If you post what you have, I’ll take over from there until I get tired of it.

Would a translation of enhanced perceptual functioning theory into more everyday language be helpful to anyone here? I might be able to do it.

To make it maximally helpful, let me know what particular terms or examples they use are particularly hard to understand.

It would be helpful to me, and to pretty much everyone who’s said they had trouble with it.

I’m not able to go through it and tell you what’s hard to understand. It’s the whole thing. It’s the way it’s written. It’s the fact that it’s not in plain English, it’s written in a way that just looks like random letters strung together unless I work really hard at it. And I’ve worked really hard at it, and gotten a lot out of it, but every time I read it it’s just as hard again.

OK. I may be able to get started much later tonight or tomorrow, then.

When I have a first draft can I send it to you, and you can tell me if it’s clear enough? If it’s not, I’ll try again. These ideas are so important they should be accessible to everyone!

Hey, before you start, alwaysfaithfulterriblelizard has already got the beginning up, and I’m almost to principle 3, at which point I’m going to quit. So if you want, maybe you could start from there and you don’t have to do the whole thing?