A possible Autism cure that I saw on TV

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If that is such a great thing - then why not teach NT kids to behave like autistic ones, and reorder society to work so it expects everyone to be autistic?

If you don't like that idea, or think it is unfair to the NT kids (you'd be right, by the way) - that just exposes the flaw in thinking this is acceptable. They are trying to condition human beings to be something they are not. When communist countries set up programs to condition dissidents to accept communism - so they can fit into their society - everyone howls. When it is done to helpless kids who have a "disorder", why is it somehow better? (And why is the diagnosis of "disorder" in dissidents - who, likewise, do not function well in their society - unacceptable, if such a diagnosis is acceptable for us?)

What part of I saw that cure on TV don't you understand? I did NOT have this idea, a scientist I saw on TV mentioned these methods. You are one of the few posters that missed the point of the OP. -_-

This...was...NOT....my...IDEA!

(Edited out the shocked part so people get the whole thread)

Last edited by Snivy on 01 Mar 2011, 1:14 pm, edited 2 times in total.

That is like saying look how great and well run Nazi Germany was so can't you just ignore the racial genocide or rapid expansionism into neighboring friendly nations. I would so like to call you an as*hole but that is against the rules so I won't.

No.
Why not just slap their face hard or break another finger instead?

Surely by definition it's not possible to force someone to act instinctively?
A dog trained to salivate on hearing a bell ring is not acting instinctively.

Sounds like the type of conditioning used in A Clockwork Orange. A scary concept if you wanna start doing it to children. Well, it's a scary concept in the first place...

You are making some faulty assumptions. First, the zapped part is relevant since the pain of the zap is the primary vector for incucing behavior modification. This being the case, you must examine the psychological effects of behavior modification through selective application of pain.

You also are suggesting that only visible behaviors are allowed within the measure of success. This does nothing to measure the actual internal states of the individuals, it only measures compliance. A person can be trained to comply and fully exhibit the trained behaviors at the same time as being utterly miserable on the inside. Any psyche structured on a disconnect between internal states and external behaviors is intrinsically unstable.

Further, since only visible behaviors are included in the evaluation of compliance, the set of accepted behaviors is subject to the whims of the culture at large. This raises the specter of arbitrary adoption of behaviors "for the common good" that are discriminatory and racist. Even if you posit that reasonable people would not adopt such cultural norms, you cannot avoid the truth that not all people are reasonable and that some people excel at aggregating power to the furtherance of their own interests. Such aggregators of power will seek to protect their positions by whatever means possible, including "zapping" people into compliance.

Any way you look at it, forcing behavior changes through pain is a bad idea.

Hey, OP, are you by any chance a fan of the Judge Rotenberg Center?

You support it, why else you have posted this "great idea" as a possible cure for autism? Maybe you are mistaking ignorance as shock.

Ooh, that's gooood.

This is the last time I reply to you.


This doesn't mean I "support" the idea. I am in fact, very neutral on this. I saw this on television, and I was hoping to get everyone's views on whether or not this type of conditioning treatment could be effective. No where did I ask for your snide remarks.

Coward maybe?

I'm curious why you haven't responded to my comments on arbitrary determinations of acceptable behaviors based on variable social norms.



Don't be silly. Nobody ever ASKS for snide remarks. Snide remarks are inspired.

Yes, it is relevant. People just look at the word "zapped" and not get the whole point of the original post. It's relevant, but not the point.


I might have to ask you to elaborate on this.




It's not the pain. The pain was just there to suppress behavior that scientists find innapropriate. The stimming and meltdowns etc.

I will honor your request and only discuss non-shock parts of the post. People naturally gravitated to that because it's, well, shocking. But there is much else.

This is unfair to the child and in any country with compulsory education, illegal. Some U.S. states don't have mandatory kindergarten and in those states sometimes parents don't enroll their children in kindergarten even though they have reached age 5 because the child's birthday is right near the age cut-off or they don't think the child is ready. That's something that can only be done that one time, though. When the next academic year starts, in they go, ready or not. Which is a good thing since some kids may not conform to age expectations until much older or never and they should not be denied an education because of that. There is also a ceiling on how many times a school system can hold a child back. A lot of kids are never going to mesh well in a typical classroom. Special Ed, aids and accomodations (504 plans, IEPs), and alternative schools are far better than telling a kid (and his parents), "you can't go to middle school until you do this, this and this". The IDEA law prevents such barriers from being erected.



I would say "teach" rather than "condition" because truly meshing in social situations and workplaces requires fluid understanding of what's going on, not rote responses.


not on my watch

As I said in an earlier post, that doesn't really work. Videos of typical kids can be educational, but more in an "opening a dialogue" way than in an imitative way. I've watched a fair number of Hannah Montana videos with my daughter. This did not convert her into a giggly extrovert like Miley Cyrus. However it did open a dialogue about why certain characters said certain things or did certain things. Videos can be useful that way if watched with a person who can answer questions about what just happened. This happened on our couch, not in an instiution. We have actually been in instiutional settings with videos of typical kids playing. It's common practice these days for waiting rooms in children's health clinics and hospitals to have TVs playing the popular kids' shows. But at those times she is entirely focused on the institutional setting and ignores the TV.




This is a good one. It's actually the norm for the modern autistic child, at least in industrialized countries with autism programs and education. Speech therapy, including pragmatic speech therapy, is a fundamental part of the education of modern autistic kids.



Dressing to fit in just won't ever happen and that's fine. For kids with motor planning difficulties, learning "the proper way to dress" translates into learning the cumbersome mechanics of some clothes. Zippers, buttons, laces and snaps all present their own challenges. Occupational therapists (and parents) address this. But it's about learnig how to work the fasteners, not about how to be fashionable.


There are social skills groups for this. My daughter is in one. It's part of the standard procedure for educating an autistic child these days.


At my daughter's school, and in many specialty schools, the reward/punish system works out to awarding privileges for certain behavior (computer game time, toy time, etc.) and losing those privileges for misbehaviour. It's pretty mechanistic and behaviorist but it does seem to help. To be honest, that's how it works in the wider world too. At least the "taking away privileges" part. (Losing drivers license, paying fine, going to jail.)



I don't think you can condition a child to watch a program. You can put it on the TV and they pay attention or they don't. And if they pay attention, you can't control what lessons they are actually learning from it. You can try, with discussion but that's just an attempt. No actual conditioning happens. Just maybe some learning if adult and child discuss the important themes in the show (and what constitutes an important theme is not necessarily something adult and child will agree on).


I wouldn't do this unless the child had a really worrying special interest, such as an interest in stalking a neighbor or killing animals. But interests that don't actually cause harm I would categorize as just fine whatever they are.


I have an extremely broad defintion of "appropriate" and would encourage other parents to also. If it isn't harmful, let it be.



When the time comes, I will have that talk with my daughter. Currently she is not interested. If reaches adulthood without becoming interested, then it's a moot point.



I would change "doctors" to "parents" here because I wouldn't have the child raised by doctors (i.e. institutionalized). Like many parents, I work to help my daughter with her sensory sensitivities. There are work-arounds a child can do, such as wearing headphones to block out noise and keeping a bottle of preferred scent on hand to block out noxious scents. I have no need to deliberately alter my daughter's routines. Life itself alters everybody's routines from time to time. The best I can do is help her use her coping strategies to deal with that.

Last edited by Janissy on 01 Mar 2011, 1:54 pm, edited 2 times in total.

I was just thinking the same thing.