Tag Archives: Autism

Autism, Autism And Driving, Highway Safety, Teens

Autistic Teens Want To Drive

A study released by the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) Center For Injury Research and Prevention (CIRP) looks at teens with high-functioning autism spectrum disorders and driving.  They found that, among their sample of 300 teens, two-thirds are already driving or expect to drive.

“As a clinician who specializes in children with disabilities, I was interested to find that so many teens with high functioning autism spectrum disorders want to drive and do,” says Patty Huang, MD, a developmental and behavioral pediatrician at CHOP and the lead author of the study. “We need to help them. Establishing a few indicators for these teens that will likely have an interest in driving is the first step in developing targeted strategies and interventions to support them and their families.”

The findings suggest that parents of teens with HFASDs would benefit from guidance in deciding if driving is the right choice for their individual family. Readiness to drive can be difficult to assess, and parents should be encouraged to seek the help of their child’s physician, an occupational therapist or driving instructor.

Modern Driver Institute is the only driver education provider in Pennsylvania that specializes in working with individuals with autism.   We recommend that driving goals be incorporated into your student’s Individual Education Plan (IEP).

Autism And Driving

Wretches and Jabberers Special Screening

Tracy Thresher and Larry Bissonnette visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Photograph courtesy of Douglas Biklen

This April, the Autism Society and AMC Theatres have teamed up to bring the new film Wretches & Jabberers to 40 cities in a special limited release. Wretches & Jabberers is a ground-breaking documentary about two men with autism who embark on a global quest to change attitudes about disability, intelligence and communication.  The film’s stars, self-advocates Tracy Thresher, 42, and Larry Bissonnette, 52, have limited speech and type to communicate. Growing up, people presumed they had intellectual disabilities and they were excluded from typical schooling. They faced lives of social isolation in institutions or adult disability centers. When, as adults, they learned to communicate by typing, it dramatically changed their lives.

See it locally on Saturday, April 2 at noon at the AMC Neshaminy 24 in Philadelphia.

We are spreading the word about this film because it highlights the real lives of adults living with autism. Today, many individuals with developmental disabilities are facing a crisis. For example, Tracy is homeless and sleeps in a different place each night. Projected government budget cuts mean the already scarce services and supports provided by Medicaid are even more vulnerable. On the other hand, the film portrays the potential of people with autism as Tracy and Larry show audiences around the world that they are “the perfect example of intelligence working out itself in a much different way.”

This exceptional film is making one stop in a theater near you in April. This is a huge opportunity to raise awareness about the issues faced by adults with autism and other disabilities today. We appreciate AMC Theatres for providing this very rare opportunity for an independent documentary to have such a long run in large mainstream movie theaters. AMC is generously donating 10% of ticket sales to the Autism Society to commemorate Autism Awareness Month. Please visit www.amctheatres.com/wretchesandjabberers to buy presale tickets.

Our goal is to show our dedication and pride, fill theaters, increase awareness and support Tracy and Larry’s efforts by sharing their story with the world. This film has the power to make people pay attention to the critical issues faced by others like Tracy and Larry, and to acknowledge that everyone deserves respect and that we should always “presume competence,” which is evident if we just stop and listen.

We hope you are able to attend one of the showings. Please also help us spread the word by sharing this information with all of your e-mail lists, friends, families and colleagues, and encourage them to go see Wretches and Jabberers at a theater near them this April. The listing of theater locations and dates follows. You can watch the movie trailer or find more information at the Wretches and Jabberers website http://www.wretchesandjabberers.org, and don’t forget, you can pre-order tickets at www.amctheatres.com/wretchesandjabberers. Working together, we can change lives!

Simulator Training, Teens

Can Simulators Help Autistic Teens Learn To Drive?

Thanks to a $100,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Defense, researchers at the University of Virginia are now studying the use of virtual reality driving simulators to train and evaluate the skills of teens with Asperger’s and high-functioning autism, both of which are considered autism spectrum disorders.

Driving a car is an important step toward independence for adolescents and young adults. With no legal restrictions on driving with autism spectrum disorder, this study aims to assess and develop driving skills in teens with Asperger’s and high-functioning autism, or HFA, and work around the symptoms that interfere with learning to drive.

“The symptoms of Asperger’s and HFA make learning to drive particularly challenging for individuals with this disorder,” said Ron Reeve, a professor in U.Va.’s Curry School of Education and a licensed clinical and school psychologist, who is the study’s co-investigator. “For example, they may hyper-focus on one aspect of driving and struggle with the multi-tasking required to simultaneously keep the car in the correct lane, maintain an appropriate distance from the car ahead, attend to a changing stoplight or other signal.”

Adolescents with Asperger’s and HFA have a high need for structure and predictability, which may present difficulty when unexpected disruptions break the routine – an almost daily occurrence when one is behind the wheel.

“Their difficulties with motor planning and coordination may interfere with the complexity of simultaneously steering, accelerating, judging time and distance and hazard detection,” Reeve noted.

The benefits of using the virtual reality driving simulator are multifold. The simulator offers safe exposure to challenging defensive driving demands. It also can play back and rehearse challenging maneuvers without the potential human element of getting frightened or frustrated with the driving performance of HFA trainees.

Daniel Cox, professor of behavioral medicine in the School of Medicine and co-principal investigator of the study, has utilized the simulator to effectively teach teens with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder to drive more safely.

The latest study, to begin this summer, will involve 20 HFA teenagers, each with a learner’s permit. Half the teens will receive virtual reality driving simulator training (10 sessions of progressively demanding maneuvers), going from learning how to maintain lane position to adding speed control, then braking, use of mirrors, turn signals, etc. Once the participants have reviewed these maneuvers, they will be applied in progressively more demanding virtual traffic and road conditions.

The other half of the study group will receive whatever training they would normally receive. For example, these teens will potentially receive on-the-road training with parents, driver’s education instructors or even professional driver’s training. Both study groups will be evaluated afterward by qualified, independent driving evaluators who will not know who did and did not receive the virtual reality training.

The study expects to report its findings by the summer of 2012.

“We hope that by controlling the complexities of driving for these teens on the simulator, and by replaying mistakes to provide a safe environment for practice, we can build skills in teen drivers with Asperger’s and high-functioning autism,” Cox said. However, he noted, “Not all individuals with autism spectrum disorders will be able to develop the skills to safely drive a car, and we hope the simulator will also help us determine who is and who is not a good candidate to become an independent driver.”

Source: University of Virginia website