Dr. Betty Williams presented research on the causes of autism to a crowd of over 200 people Wednesday night in the Robinson Teaching Theatre. Williams is the Edward B. Lindaman chair and a professor of education at Whitworth.
Williams previously taught for 19 years at Gonzaga and is now in her tenth year teaching at Whitworth. She has also co-authored the book "Very Young Children with Special Needs." Williams said she has spent time traveling and visiting treatment centers across the
As Williams began her presentation on diagnosing autism, she called on the audience to find out who she was speaking to. Members of the audience named their interests with hands raised. Some members included parents with autistic children, others were providers for individuals with autism and the rest were interested audience members.
Throughout the night, Williams covered a wide range of research within autism including Autism Spectrum Disorder, which causes severe impairment in thinking, language and brain function. This disorder also affects brain structure, genetics and serotonin evidence.
“Fifty years ago, autism was a rare condition; now, one out of every 150 children is diagnosed with this devastating disorder. The unprecedented rise in autism has fueled enormous speculation and intense research to identify its cause,” according to a Whitworth April 2 press release.
Williams said the next born child has a three in six chance of attaining autism.
Williams suggest some of the ways in diagnosing autism include but are not limited to: limited cognition, unusual sensory sensitivities, seizure disorders, sleep disturbances, eating problems, deficits in “mind reading,” self-injury and aggression.
“In the last ten years, the rates have increased much faster than rate for people with disabilities,” Williams said.
Williams said funding has been increased dramatically as the National Institute of Health funded $52 million dollars in 2000 and is providing $945 million over a five year period which started research in 2006.
“We’re still in an ocean trying to find a vaccine," she said.
She said one of the hard things about conducting research is that there are so many autistic children that it's hard to keep track of all the research.
Contact Erica Schrader at erica.schrader@whitworthian.com.
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