Concerning Control | Human Restoration Project | Mal Radagast
Mal reflects on the contradictions of classroom control that often conflict with the purpose of education. Published by Human Restoration Project, a 501(c)3 organization restoring humanity to education.
Anil Dash's keynote video from Oh the Humanity!Anil Dash leads the team behind Glitch, the friendly developer community where coders have collaborated to cre...
AI generates covertly racist decisions about people based on their dialect - Nature
Despite efforts to remove overt racial prejudice, language models using artificial intelligence still show covert racism against speakers of African American English that is triggered by features of the dialect.
Remote Work Dictionary: What Do We Mean When We Say “Remote Work”?
We are still in the first wave of remote work after the pioneering companies like Automattic, GitLab, Buffer, Zapier, Ghost, and more laid the groundwork and proven to the world that remote work is…
Community Member Views on Autism Intervention: Effects of Closeness to Autistic People with Intellectual Disabilities And Nonspeaking Autistic People | Autism in Adulthood
Background: Controversy regarding the neurodiversity movement (NDM), the social and medical models of disability, autism intervention goals, and causal attributions of disability contributes to divides in the autistic and autism communities. The present study investigates the views of autistic and non-autistic autistic and autism community members on these topics. We explored whether these views are shaped by having close relationships to autistic people with intellectual disabilities (ID) and nonspeaking autistic (NSA) people. Methods: A total of 504 autistic and autism community members (278 autistic, 226 non-autistic) completed an online survey about theoretical models and intervention goals. Participants reported whether they had one or more close relationships with NSA people, autistic people with ID, neither, or both. Results: Overall, there was considerable consensus regarding desired intervention goals: normalization goals were generally opposed, while participants generally supported well-being, societal reform, supportive environment, and adaptive skill goals. While autistic participants reported less support for normalization and adaptive skills goals than non-autistic participants, they expressed somewhat more enthusiasm for societal reform and supportive environments than non-autistic people. Autistic people supported the NDM more and the medical model less than non-autistic people. Those close to autistic people with ID gave higher ratings to adaptive skill goals. On average, participants not close to autistic people with ID saw the challenges of those without ID as being slightly more due to environmental/social factors than the challenges of those with ID; there was no such statistical difference among those close to autistic people with ID. Conclusion: Further research investigating community views, with the inclusion of more autistic people with ID and NSA people themselves, is needed, but the results of this study suggest that the broader autistic and autism communities see NDM-consistent intervention goals as appropriate for all autistic people, including NSA people and those with ID. As autism interventions have often pursued unpopular normalization goals, this suggests directions for reform. Community Brief Why is this an important issue? Disagreements about the neurodiversity movement have divided autistic people, their family members, and autism professionals. These include debates about whether the neurodiversity movement includes and represents the interests of autistic people who may have higher support needs, such as nonspeaking individuals and autistic people with intellectual disabilities. They also include debates about what goals autism interventions and supports should focus on. What is the purpose of this study? The purpose of this study is to explore the views of autistic and autism community members (e.g., autistic people, family members, and professionals) on: the neurodiversity movement, the social model of disability (which views society as the source of disability-related challenges), the medical model of disability (which says disabled people’s own characteristics cause disability-related challenges), and different autism intervention goals. We explored whether these views are related to whether participants were autistic and/or had close relationships with autistic people with higher support needs. What did the researchers do? We collected online survey responses from 504 autistic people, family members, and autism professionals. Participants shared whether they were close to nonspeaking autistic people or autistic people with intellectual disabilities. Participants answered questions about various intervention goals and their support for the neurodiversity movement and other models of disability. What were the results of this study? Both autistic and non-autistic participants supported the neurodiversity movement and interventions that aim to change society, create supportive environments for autistic people, and promote well-being. Both autistic and non-autistic participants generally opposed interventions trying to make autistic people more normal, but autistic people were especially unlikely to support the goals of making autistic people normal. Autistic people were less enthusiastic about the goal of teaching “useful” skills and more strongly opposed to the medical model. Autistic people were more likely than non-autistic people to support the neurodiversity movement, reforming society and creating better environments for autistic people, but these differences were not large. Participants close to autistic people with intellectual disabilities supported teaching useful skills slightly more than those not close. What do these findings add to what is already known? These findings further our understanding of the perspectives of autistic and autism community members on neurodiversity, models of disability, and preferred intervention goals. What are the potential weaknesses of this study? The participants in this study were mostly White women from North America and Europe. We obtained few responses from people who more strongly oppose the neurodiversity movement or from autistic individuals who have the highest support needs. This means that our findings do not represent all autistic and autism community members. Different participants may also have understood the idea of a “close relationship” differently. How will these findings help autistic adults now or in the future? These findings may be useful to autistic adults and other members of the autistic and autism communities who want to connect with others and advocate for autism intervention research that fits their shared goals. Results can help professionals to develop interventions that better match the goals of different members of the autistic and autism communities.
Learning About Neurodiversity at School: A feasibility study of a new classroom programme for mainstream primary schools - Alyssa M. Alcorn, Sarah McGeown, William Mandy, Dinah Aitken, Sue Fletcher-Watson, 2024
Neurodivergent children educated in mainstream classrooms too often face poor outcomes compared to neurotypical peers. These may be caused, or exacerbated, by t...
Neurodiverse individuals face conflicting expectations about emotional expression. Gus Walz's story reveals the bias and challenges around being authentic.
AI worse than humans in every way at summarising information, government trial finds
A test of AI for Australia's corporate regulator found that the technology might actually make more work for people, not less.
Artificial intelligence is worse than humans in every way at summarising documents and might actually create additional work for people, a government trial of the technology has found.
These reviewers overwhelmingly found that the human summaries beat out their AI competitors on every criteria and on every submission, scoring an 81% on an internal rubric compared with the machine’s 47%.
Human summaries ran up the score by significantly outperforming on identifying references to ASIC documents in the long document, a type of task that the report notes is a “notoriously hard task” for this type of AI. But humans still beat the technology across the board.
Speculative Care Futures is a report written from the perspective of of an imagined social care facility providing day services for adults described as having Profound and Multiple Learning Disabil…
This study provides an analysis of how the term “media literacy” has been defined by authors of articles published in the Journal of Media Literacy Education. It generates answers to two questions: (1) To what extent does there appear to be a shared meaning for the term “media literacy” across authors who publish articles on this topic, and (2) When authors cite definitions of media literacy, which sources do they use most often? The findings of this content analysis reveal that there are a great many definitions being used for media literacy as well as a large number of sources being cited for those definitions. This study uncovered more than 400 definitional elements, which were then organized into a six-category scheme that reflects the full span of thinking exhibited by authors of the 210 articles published in this journal.
Neurodivergent-designed and neurodivergent-led peer support in school: A feasibility and acceptability study of the neurodivergent peer support toolkit (NEST) - Catherine J Crompton, Francesca Fotheringham, Katie Cebula, Charlotte Webber, Sarah Foley, Sue Fletcher-Watson, 2024
Most neurodivergent students attend mainstream schools; however, it can be difficult to make and keep friends, and it is common for neurodivergent people to fee...
Predictive validity of self-report questionnaires in the assessment of autism spectrum disorders in adults - PubMed
While various screening instruments for autism spectrum disorders are widely used in diagnostic assessments, their psychometric properties have not been simultaneously evaluated in the outpatient setting where these instruments are used most. In this study, we tested the Ritvo Autism Asperger Diagno …
The positive predictive values indicate that these tests correctly identified autism spectrum disorder patients in almost 80% of the referred cases. However, the negative predictive values suggest that only half of the referred patients without autism spectrum disorder were correctly identified. The sensitivity and specificity of each of these instruments were much lower than the values reported in the literature. In this study, the sensitivity of the Ritvo Autism Asperger Diagnostic Scale-Revised was the highest (73%), and the Autism-Spectrum Quotient short forms had the highest specificity (70% and 72%).
Understanding the Self-identification of Autism in Adults: a Scoping Review - Review Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders
Adults are increasingly self-identifying as autistic, and reporting problems being referred for an autism diagnostic assessment. This scoping review aims to ascertain: (1) what research has been conducted on the self-identification process of autism in adults, who do and do not have a formal diagnosis of autism, and (2) which aspects of the self-identification process could be used to improve the referral and the diagnostic process of an adult autism assessment. The main themes identified were: the diagnostic process from a client´s perspective; the process of self-identifying as autistic from a lifespan perspective; an autistic identity; sexual identity and experiences, and the perception of autism as a difference or a disability. These themes could positively enhance the referral and diagnostic process.
Sylvia Duckworth on Instagram: "“Intersectionality” is a term coined by Kimberlé Crenshaw to help explain how one’s identity markers intersect and effect one’s life experiences. The markers in this drawing are not complete as I was limited by space. What’s missing?"
1,201 likes, 23 comments - sylviaduckworth on August 9, 2020: "“Intersectionality” is a term coined by Kimberlé Crenshaw to help explain how one’s identity markers intersect and effect one’s life experiences. The markers in this drawing are not complete as I was limited by space. What’s missing?".
Barriers to healthcare and a ‘triple empathy problem’ may lead to adverse outcomes for autistic adults: A qualitative study - Sebastian CK Shaw, Laura Carravallah, Mona Johnson, Jane O’Sullivan, Nicholas Chown, Stuart Neilson, Mary Doherty, 2024
Autistic people experience more co-occurring health conditions and, on average, die younger than non-autistic people. Despite growing awareness of health inequi...
Exploring Autistic Sexualities, Relationality, and Genders: Living Under a Double Rainbow
This edited collection of contributions explores non-normative genders, sexualities, and relationality among Autistic people.
Written within an explicitly neuro-affirmative frame, the collection celebrates the diversity and richness of Autistic identity, sexuality, gender, and relationships, exploring areas such as consent, embodiment, ink, kink, sex education, and therapeutic work. All editors and contributors are neurodivergent and members of the communities that the book focuses on, providing
Previously I’ve written about the importance of recognising and valuing different forms of communication and the need for us to allow for expressive as well as functional communication. In this pie…
Communal Space as an autistic person or: What’s the big deal about other people?
For a long time I didn’t really understand what the big deal was about being with other people. Yes, they could be funny, kind and interesting. But frankly, as far as I was concerned, I was already…
A true communal space or experience is one where people can be themselves, together.
A true communal space is life changing. It’s motivating, it’s energising, it makes you feel valued. I feel it most when I spend time with other autistic people and feel free of needing to censor myself or change who I am. But I should be able to do this in the wider world too. I meet children who’ve maybe never even been able to do this, being with other people is still just something difficult, painful and suffocating. They are constantly compromising and it exhausts them. But it doesn’t have to be this way and i don’t think they should have to wait until their an adult to figure that out. We can work to create these spaces for them as well as ourselves.
This is what I’m currently calling my ongoing work in figuring out ways to describe, name, visualise and generally communicate autistic ways of being particularly autistic ways of playing, co…
U.S. Gender and Disability Justice Alliance - Women Enabled International
Who We Are The U.S. Gender and Disability Justice Alliance (USGDJA or the Alliance) is a new disability justice-oriented collective convening women, nonbinary persons, and other gender minorities with disabilities from across the United States together to take action on issues important to our community. Mission Statement We aim to educate policymakers, related human and […]
