Comments on: Shocking news from Danish autism epidemiolgists!

By: Ian MacGregor

Ian MacGregor — Sun, 21 Mar 2010 14:29:38 +0000

I switched the p values. For the crime of arson the study group was more likely to be convicted, p value .0009 and for traffic violations , the control group was more likely to be convicted, the pvalue was .006.

By: Ian MacGregor

Ian MacGregor — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 17:24:07 +0000

Anne, the study could have been based on arrest records. The study used convictions because it is a higher standard of guilt.

By: Anne

Anne — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 17:12:54 +0000

I’m not sure how it would be possible to do a study on the rate of commission of crimes without conviction. Where would you find any record of that? Or would you just ask your subjects whether they’ve ever committed a crime, regardless of whether they were caught? I guess you could compare autistic and control groups on the rate of admission of wrongdoing.

By: ebohlman

ebohlman — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 17:10:15 +0000

Now, what’s needed is a study comparing crime victimization rates between autistics and non-autistics. It often turns out to be the case that when a group is popularly perceived as having a high crime rate, they actually have a high victimization rate instead.

By: Ian MacGregor

Ian MacGregor — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 02:38:04 +0000

I would not get overly excited about this study. The matching was by gender, birthdate within a day. birthplace, and social group.

The control group was committed had significantly more traffic violations, the study group had significantly more violations for arson. The respective p values were .0009 and .006. There were several situations were the study group was more likely to commit crimes than the control group and vive versa, but not significantly so.

By: AutismNewsBeat

AutismNewsBeat — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 02:10:40 +0000

Is it more likely for judge or a prosecutor to seem extra-legal remedy for an offense if it is determined the suspect has autism? For instance, dismissing the case in exchange for enrollment in a treatment program, or being remanded to the custody of a guardian?

By: dedicated lurker

dedicated lurker — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 22:23:43 +0000

farmwifetwo: This would only be applicable if the ASD kids had the higher crime conviction rate. The study states the opposite.

By: David N. Brown

David N. Brown — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 21:51:52 +0000

Sorry for near-duplicate comments… It looked like the spam filter got the first one.

By: David N. Brown

David N. Brown — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 19:26:15 +0000

“I am going to pick faults with the study because it equates crime with criminal conviction.”
A significant issue, but one which works both ways: If those with a disability are more likely to be CAUGHT, the group’s crime rate could appear higher than it is. I can say from my own experience just with school authorities that when I broke the rules (mostly by fighting back against bullies), I was perfectly willing to accept the consequences.

By: David N. Brown

David N. Brown — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 19:20:19 +0000

“I am going to pick faults with the study because it equates crime with criminal conviction.”
An important point, but one which can work both ways: When the notion that those with the “double Y” chromosomal disorder was being considered, one possibility investigated was that those who did commit crime were caught more often.
Something I can say from my own experience in elementary school is that when I broke the rules (usually by fighting back when other kids abused me),I don’t remember ever going to the trouble of trying to avoid being caught. I expected to be caught, which I suppose could be considered a theory of mind issue.