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Autistic kids better off if they have white, educated mothers
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/claire-mccarthy-md/autism-social-justice_b_1395980.html
A child with autism is more likely to do well if his mother is white and educated.
This is the message of a study just released in the journal Pediatrics, and it's something we need to pay attention to -- now.
Researchers from Columbia University wanted to find out what happens to children with autism over time. So they looked at the records of more than 6000 children with autism who were enrolled in California's Department of Developmental Services (DDS). To get into DDS they had to be referred, and their diagnosis had to be confirmed by someone with expertise in autism.
What they found was that when it came to social and communication skills, for the most part the kids fell into groups ranging from low-functioning to high functioning. The kids did make progress; the most rapid gains were before age six, and the high-functioning kids tended to make more progress than the low-functioning ones. Even as they made progress they tended to stay in the group they started in -- with one notable exception. That exception was a group the researchers called the "Bloomers". These kids were low-functioning when they were diagnosed, but made rapid gains and ended up as high-functioning.
The researchers also looked at the birth records of the children,
which gave them facts about the mother's age, race, place of birth,
education level, and whether she was on Medi-Cal, the California version
of Medicaid (the public insurance for low-income people). This is where
it gets really interesting. They found that:
- Kids in the low-functioning groups were more likely to have mothers who were non-white and/or foreign-born, less-educated, and on Medi-Cal.
- Kids in the high-functioning groups were more likely to have a mothers who were white, more educated, and not on Medi-Cal.
- Bloomers were more likely to have mothers who were white and educated.
This is a real social justice problem.
The researchers didn't have information on what kinds of services or treatments the kids got, so they couldn't give an explanation for what they found. But they guessed, as all of us might, that children with more educated and affluent mothers not only had better home and neighborhood environments, but access to more and better services -- and parents who were more able to fight for those services.
That makes total sense to me as the pediatrician of many autistic children, and is a social justice problem in and of itself. But there is even more that worried me reading this article. Why, for example, were fewer poor and minority kids in the high-functioning group? Do they slip through the cracks entirely because they are muddling through, and never get diagnosed or get services? And why are there fewer white and affluent kids in the low-functioning group? Is there something about being poor or minority that makes autism worse from the beginning?
Just last week the Centers for Disease Control came out with the news that one in 88 children has autism, up 23 percent since 2009. It's five times more common in boys--the rate for them is one in 54. And here's what makes the Pediatrics article even more worrisome: the biggest increases were among Hispanic and black children -- their rates of autism went up 110 percent and 91 percent, respectively. Not only is this a social justice problem, it's a public health problem.
There is hope for many children with autism -- this study shows that clearly. But it is fundamentally unfair when hope -- or lack of it -- is an accident of birth.
We say that we are a country founded on the idea that all men are created equal. Autism just may test us on this. If all men are created equal, if all children are equally deserving of a good future, it's time to get to work. It's time to put real money and real energy into understanding autism's inequalities -- and ending them.
Meredith, 6-1-06 and Alex, 11-5-09
Re: Autistic kids better off if they have white, educated mothers
A child with autism is more likely to do well if his mother is white and educated.
Why is this the conclusion? I would think it more has to do with the ..."and not on Medi-Cal" part. Many of the treatments that a friend of mine has researched for her son are not covered by insurance and the services are generally not convenient to get to. I could see how a woman or family with limited financial resources would not likely get the same care as someone who has plenty of money at their disposal to try experimental treatments that are not reimbursed by insurance companies and has flexibility to sah or have a flexible work schedule that would allow travel time to get to these various treatments.
yup.
I guess the conclusion we must draw is that we should adopt out all the children with autism to white women with college degrees and a stable job...
Click me, click me!
Meredith, 6-1-06 and Alex, 11-5-09
Not just that, but they may also be more likely to live in good school districts (or have the resources to move to one) where school services are more available, and more intensive. I also think more educated mothers are more likely to be able to put their kids in better daycare centers/ preschools, where providers are better educated on the early signs.
see more Failbook
No, kids of mothers who have been taught they have a voice and that they can argue for things from authority figures. That's the middle class privilidge.
Although, apparently the ability to spell the word priveledge isn't included.
I should preface this with a) I 100% agree white
Privilege exists and 2) I 100% agree it's much easier to be white, educated, and financially stable in this country
That being said, I disagree with your view on challenging authority.if anything, white middle class culture is taught to follow authority, where as many minority groups, because they have had to fight for everything, are taught to fight authority and question it. In one, they are opusually taught that adults should be granted automatic respect. In others, they have to earn it.
I also wanted to say that even for middle class parents like myself, we can technically afford his ABA therapy, but not easily. It is covered by insurance, but our copay's are $50/ day. We do 2 days per week, though they recommended more. But that's on top of the $56/day preschool he attends which is the only one that would take an un-potty trained child. And for our area of the country, yes, that's expensive. I'm curious whether Medicaid pays for ABA, and whether there is a copay. It's possible that if it's fully covered without copay, someone would be able to use more than the 4 hrs a week we do (they recommended 20). But, if someone is on Medicaid I don't envision them having the flexibility in their job to make it all work out easily. Accessing the resources would be tough.
Zeus and Bubba
Yea, I'm pretty sure that should read:
A child with autism is more likely to do well if the family has money. Families with white and educated mothers are more likely to have money.
This is exactly what I thought reading the title.
Zuma Zoom
Ding Ding Ding!
Yep.
I agree with you all that money is undeniably part of the equation, the therapies (all of which but ABA are generally not covered by insurance) are expensive.
However, the article seems to point to a higher proportion of "low-functioning" vs. "high-functioning" in minority communities. This, too me, is an important issue worth exploring. Are there any cultural roadblocks to pursuing diagnosis in a higher-functioning individual? Are certain stigmas about mental disabilities more prevalent in some communities than others? I don't know, but these are fair questions to ask, because the answers could help streamline the right kind of awareness campaigns to begin the tough work of changing views.
Even just based on my experience in my own family when we shared DS's diagnosis, certain people found it hard to swallow that there was any kind of "disability," especially when 30 years ago, DS probably would've been just passed off as a quirky, painfully shy and emotional kid.
/Edited to fix my sloppy post
Zeus and Bubba
I don't find this surprising unfortunately. I think it is the same reason that SAT, ACT and other standardized test scores continually show that affluent children of educated parents do better on the tests. Additionally, while this is even more controversial, there have been some reports of actual IQ differences in various groups (don't know about these to comment) but generally... as bad as this sounds and i am sure I will get flamed, people are not the same. They don't have the same opportunity, they don't have the same genetics, they don't have the same potential. That does not mean certain people are better than others, it just means that unlike the refrian of we are all equal, we are not, never have been, and likely never will be unfortunately.
Maybe that is the cynical response.
I thought this, too. It's more like, if you're white, you're less likely to be on Medi-Cal and if you're on Medi-Cal you're less likely to do well.
Why didn't they control for this stuff. Like, examine the subgroups. Do white mothers on medi-cal have the same results as minority mothers on medi-cal? Honestly, it couldn't have been that hard to parse out that information.
Why yes. Look at Obama! All the proof there you need.
#PostRacialSociety
The mother is typically the primary caregiver. The mother is going to notice something is wrong with the child first. At least that's the link I've seen to most studies as to why they pick the mother over the father.
And boom goes the dynamite.
Click me, click me!