C.U. Prof’s Autism Study Draws Parent Criticism
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Charles H. Dyson Professor of Management Michael Waldman’s theory suggesting that watching television may trigger autism in young children received both praise and backlash when it was published in The Wall Street Journal on Feb. 27. The article revealed the results of Waldman’s research as well as the work of Prof. Sean Nicholson, policy analysis and management, and postdoctoral associate Nodir Adilov, both of whom worked with Waldman.
According to the national organization Autism Speaks, autism is “A complex neurobiological disorder that typically lasts throughout a person’s lifetime. It is part of a group of disorders known as Autism Spectrum Disorders. Autism impairs a person’s ability to communicate and relate to others.”
Waldman’s interest in the topic takes root in his personal life: his son was diagnosed with ASD at a young age. He fully recovered about three years later; according to Waldman, his son’s recovery came after many therapies and a sharp reduction in time spent watching television.
“My coauthors and I conduct what economists call two natural experiments — we test to see whether autism rates vary with precipitation and cable television subscription rates in ways consistent with television being a trigger for autism. We find evidence supportive of the hypothesis in each case. What makes me very suspicious of television is that we find supportive evidence in ‘both’ cases,” Waldman said.
Gregg Easterbrook, who writes for the Washington Post’s Slate magazine, agreed with Waldman’s theory.
“Today, Cornell University researchers are reporting what appears to be a statistically significant relationship between autism rates and television watching by children under the age of 3,” he reported in his Oct. 16 article “TV Really Might Cause Autism.” “They found that as cable television became common in California and Pennsylvania beginning around 1980, childhood autism rose more in the counties that had cable than in the counties that did not. They further found that in all the Western states, the more time toddlers spent in front of the television, the more likely they were to exhibit symptoms of autism disorders.”
When the medical community failed to take interest in Waldman’s theory, he opted to continue with his ideas and formed a research team consisting of fellow economists.
“We use state-of-the-art statistical techniques to look at the hypothesis. I am quite confident that we have conducted a high quality study,” Waldman said. “Our findings are clearly suggestive of a television-autism link, and direct testing of the hypothesis by the medical community is clearly warranted at this time.”
Along with attention from the press came criticism from the parents; many feel this theory places the blame for the disease and the suffering on the parents themselves.
Virginia Breen, a mother of three autistic children, opposed Waldman’s theory in a March 10 article entitled, “Another Simplistic Blame-the-Parent Theory about Autism?” Breen’s article also appeared in The Wall Street Journal.
“TV watching can’t explain why our children are still excreting elevated levels of mercury, lead and aluminum. TV watching can’t explain why our younger daughter, who has never liked to watch TV, can’t speak and must tap out her words on a communication device. Genetic mutations and environmental triggers have caused damage to their minds and bodies,” Breen wrote.
“Families with autistic children struggle 24 hours a day, and we are flabbergasted every time one of these simplistic and unsupported blame-the-parent theories is given media attention. It is a long, hard road that we travel to recover our children from this serious affliction, and such coverage is exasperatingly harmful.”
Judy Mesch, former associate director of the University of Miami’s Center for Autism and Related Disability has worked with autism for over 30 years. According to Mesch, extensive autism research has found autism is genetic and neurological in its origin and that individuals are born with autism. This counters Waldman’s theory.
“The core way that autism develops is neurological and inborn,” Mesch said. “There is not one known cause for autism. The only thing that research at this point has definitely shown is that there is a genetic component to it, although researchers haven’t found an ‘autism gene’.”
“Autism manifests itself in two different ways. The child can show signs of autism from infancy, which allows the parents to know early on; or the child’s development is totally normal until he or she is about 18 months. Between 18 months and three years of age, verbal and social interaction skills are lost and autism’s development is seen,” Mesch said. “Either way, if an individual is born with autism it will show itself at some point in the child’s first 3 years of life.”
As for complete recovery, Mesch says most autism professionals worldwide do not believe one is possible.
“My personal feeling and the opinions of most autism professionals in the world is that you do not recover from autism; it’s lifelong and you learn to cope and live with it. You have autism; that is who you are,” she said.
Despite Mesch’s personal feelings on autism, the work done by Waldman and his team highlight the great deal of research being undertaken in an effort to combat the illness.
Michael Waldman's Theory of TV Triggering Autism is Ridiculous
Autism both familial and de novo is due to a disorder of the brain and nervous system and the only way to combat the disorder is by preventing it in the first place.
A major cause of autism, that Professor Waldman and his students might want to test out, is that older fathers, with increased spontaneous mutations in their spermatagonia and sperm, have a greater risk of fathering a child, who today is diagnosed with de novo/sporadic autism. The Copy Number Variations in genes, described in the Sebat et al. paper, from Cold Spring Harbor Laboratories, published on March 15th in "Science Express", may be the physical expression of these single and double strand breaks in DNA observed in older men.
I would appreciate it if Professor Waldman and his students find a way of testing this hypothesis. Maybe they could test it on the children in New York State or some convenient, large enough population cohort to get a stastically significant sample. The cases with familial family history will not usually, according to my hypothesis, have a paternal age effect, although these two avenues to autism could be combined.
Watching TV Does Not Cause Autism
Autism is a developmental disorder of the brain and nervous system and cannot be cured but may be prevented.
One hypothesis for the cause of de novo/sporadic autism is that the spermatagonia and sperm of ageing men develop spontaneous mutations with each cell divison. These mutations, seen as double and single strand breaks in DNA as well as alkali labile sites, may manifest as the Copy
Number Variations seen in some children with sporadic autism in the Sebat et al. study, published in "Science Express" March 15th.
Maybe Professor Waldman and his students could do a study on the children diagnosed with autism in New York State to see if, in the non-familial cases, paternal age was elevated in autism. For more information on spontaneous mutations, paternal age and neural developmental disorders in offspring please refer to the sources in my recent paper: http://ebdblog.com/paternalage/
Should Science Be Self-Serving?
Virginia Breen, the mother of three autistic children, ignores the benefits of autism research when she says,
“Families with autistic children struggle 24 hours a day, and we are flabbergasted every time one of these simplistic and unsupported blame-the-parent theories is given media attention. It is a long, hard road that we travel to recover our children from this serious affliction, and such coverage is exasperatingly harmful.”
If such theories are so obviously false, why are they so harmful? Surely, it must be frustrating for a parent to have a study to implicate them in their child's disorder, but that frustration should not supersede the need for soon-to-be parents to protect their children. The study by Waldman et al is the first step in a potentially useful line of scientific inquiry. That is, more work needs to be done before making a definitive conclusion on the autism-television link. In the meantime, prohibiting very young children from watching television is not a particularly burdensome precaution.
Complains about this research are ridiculous
All the critics just need to let the peer review process run its course. Lay members of the public have no business criticizing quantitative research of which they have no grasp. Additionally, I don't understand the argument, "Oh it's a blame the parents thing again! We all KNOW it's GENETIC!" I'm fairly certain that research suggests that anxiety disorders, schizophrenia, and drug addiction also have genetic components, but that hasn't stopped theories regarding parenting leading to schizophrenia, or external stress triggering anxiety disorders. To completely ignore variables in the environment that can be altered is what seems truly ridiculous
If Waldman et al truly
If Waldman et al truly wanted to "use state-of-the-art statistical techniques," they might examine the number of children within specific households who have autism, as compared to the number of children as a whole in those same households. If there were higher concordance between siblings in terms of ASD diagnoses, television MIGHT more reliably be seen as the culprit--not least since hours spent watching television are not wildly different from child to child in most families, especially when those children are toddlers.
I'm the parent of fraternal twin girls. One is typically developing, one has severe autism. They spent exactly the same amount of time watching exactly the same content on TV as toddlers. I find it hard to imagine that we are atypical in that regard, as a family.
If only the answer to what's behind this heartbreaking disorder were this easy to pinpoint. Statistics are only as useful as the premise they're designed to measure. This one rates bupkes on the useful meter.
Not Scientific in the Slightest
In basic survey analysis classes, one learns that there are often factors that influence findings, and they should not be included in said findings. Professor Waldman appears to be flagrantly ignoring this basic tennet of statistical research.
The survey he conducted follows three things: autism diagnoses, cable subscriptions, and precipitation (as a control). What it also inadvertantly does, is follow economic class. Those with cable subscriptions are likely to earn a higher wage than those without. Those who earn a higher wage are more likely to see a psychologist, which is a medical "luxury." Because autism has so little understanding nowadays, it is unlikely that a child who is not placed in front of a psychologist will be diagnosed. The study, by nature, excludes cases of autism that have not been diagnosed.
I can't do this research myself, but I would be willing to wager my entire next year's salary that if a similar survey were conducted using income as a variable instead of TV, it would be found that fewer poor people are autistic than rich people.
Perhaps Mr. Waldman would support quitting one's job as a method to combat the possibility their child will be autistic?
autism
We stopped watching TV about a month ago. It has been a positive influence but I have not noticed any changes in my sons behavior, maybe it is just to soon. Th Amish have almost no autism in their community, They do not watch TV but they also do not eat processed foods, have carpet and their complete environment is different. something in our modern environment that is being used around the world is activating the genetics to cause autism. We know that genetic epidemics do not exist therefore it must be something in the envirnment that is growing in our exposure to it. It could be TV or a combination of something that is in the house that is causing our kids who are genetically predisposed to have autism.