What Are Autism Symptoms,
Signs Of Autism,
And Characteristics For Autism?

All types of autism have autism symptoms in various degrees. However, not every child with autism will show every characteristic for autism. Some children will have more signs of autism than other children. Your autistic child is different from every other autistic child - and special!

In order to obtain the diagnosis of autism, your child would need to be impaired significantly more than expected for their age.

In addition, these characteristics for autism would need to be present before three years of age. Often, early signs of autism are present long before a formal diagnosis of autism is obtained. Autism in adults manifests differently than autism in children, but the basic deficits in communication abilities, social skills, and behavior are still present.

The general autism symptoms for behavioral problems may include, but are not limited to, repetitive stereotypic mannerisms called stimming, inflexibility, temper tantrums, meltdowns, aggressive behavior, self-mutilation, persistent preoccupation with parts of an object, intense preoccupation with a special interest, incoordination, poor concentration, and restricted and limited range of interests and activities.

The general signs of autism for communication problems include, but are not limited to, lack of conversational reciprocity, little or inappropriate eye contact, inability to understand and use facial expressions and body language, echolalia, difficulty understanding subtleties of language such as irony and humor, perseveration , lack of speech or impaired speech or unusual speech, confusion with pronouns, and unusual word order.

The characteristics for autism for social problems include, but are not limited to, inability to make friends, lack of appropriate social skills, unawareness of social reciprocity, inability to share with others, and lack of imaginative play.

Odd and unusual responses to sensory stimulation often occur in autism. These autism symptoms involving the visual, smell, auditory, taste, tactile, proprioception, and vestibular senses are known as sensory integration dysfunction. Your child is unable to properly integrate and interpret sensory signals reaching the brain.

Your child may also demonstrate dysgraphia which is noticeable by severely impaired handwriting and difficulty with fine motor skills.

In addition, your child may have difficulty processing auditory information and understanding verbal instructions even though hearing is normal. These problems may be a sign of central auditory processing disorder. We found that The Listening Program was a particularly effective autism therapy for this problem.

Autism symptoms often include sleep problems. Your child may have difficulty going to sleep and/or staying asleep. He may not want to stay in his own room or in his own bed. In addition, he may go to bed extremely late and want to sleep into the afternoon. Good sleep habits are essential.

Many children on the autism spectrum have tremendous difficulty with digestive problems, including constipation, irritable bowel syndrome, leaky gut syndrome, yeast overgrowth syndrome, and gastroesophageal reflux disorder (GERD) . These children may also have problems with toilet training.

Your child may show savant skills which are areas of superior ability or talent beyond what would normally be expected for the age and developmental level.

The DSM-IV outlines the autism symptoms, signs of autism, and characteristics for autism with respect to communication and social skills, or the presence of stereotyped behavior, interests, and activities for each type of autism.

Any symptom can be the result of your body trying to heal itself from the underlying cause of disease . Click on each type of autism for more detailed information about these disorders.
Rett’s Disorder

Childhood Disintegrative Disorder

Autistic Disorder

Asperger's Disorder (or Asperger's Syndrome)

Pervasive Developmental Disorder - Not Otherwise Specified (PDD-NOS)

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