Introduction
Autism refers to an intricate developmental disability (Bryna, 2008, pp 24). It is known to appear in children within their first three years of life. This developmental disability is normally caused by a neurological disarray which affects usual brain function. It thus affects the development of a child’s social and communication skills. Children who suffer from autism experience challenges with non-spoken communication, various social interactions as well as other activities which involve elements of play (Bryna, 2008, pp 27). Children are social creatures who require interaction with other people in order to flourish and grow. Socializing enables children to laugh, smile, cuddle and respond to games such as hide and seek. However, sometimes a child may not interact with other people as per the other people’s expectations. As a result, the child will appear to exist in a different world with the other people in the society. Such a child will show strange behaviors, communication difficulties and a complete lack of social consciousness or concern in other people. These characteristics indicate that such a child will be suffering from autism. Apart from the social challenges, children suffering from autism also experience intellectual difficulties. According to Bryna (2008), such children have poor brain development. The brain controls other functions of the body including communication and social interaction (Bryna, 2008, pp 30). In this connection, autism can be highly associated with poor brain development and consequently intellectual challenges because the brain has control over all the body functions. For example, children with autism experience intellectual challenges because they cannot use two word phrases at the age of twenty four months, they can’t wave other people at twelve months and they have no social skills. Although some people argue that children with autism have social problems, it can better be argued that children with autism experience intellectual challenges.
Discussion
Children with autism experience intellectual development challenges in various ways. According to Ellen (2005), such children have altered brain development (Ellen, 2005, pp 45). Children without autism develop in diverse areas in a moderately harmonious rate while children with autism do not have harmonious development rate. For example, the cognitive skills of children with autism may develop faster while their social skills as well as language skills develop slowly. Alternatively, children with autism may experience faster social skills while their cognitive skills trail behind. This shows that autism will affect the intellectual development of children and this will definitely have an effect on their social skills. Before noticing that children are affected by autism, many parents will identify certain activities that their children are unable to perform like the normal children (Ellen, 2005, pp 47). For example, if a child is not smiling at the age of six months, a parent should get concerned with the child’s brain development. It is through brain development that a child will be able to share sounds and facial expressions with other people at the age of nine months. Moreover, a child who is experiencing regression in growth will also be suffering from autism. In this connection, children with autism will experience poor intellectual growth and this will have an effect on their social skills.
Another indication that children with autism experience intellectual challenges is the unpredictability of their learning speed (Thomas & Nicole, 2011, pp 189). It is very hard to predict how quickly a child with autism learns new ideas. For example, such children may easily learn how to read long words. However, they may tend to forget the words completely a while after learning them. In addition, children with autism may also learn how to do certain things in the hardest way before they learn how to do the same things in the easiest way. Thomas and Nicole, (2011) state that, they have poor intellectual development which makes it hard for them to study new things in the same manner as the normal children (Thomas & Nicole, 2011, pp 190). Moreover, children with autism enjoy repetitive behaviors due to their poor intellectual growth. They in most cases adhere to different routines because they enjoy going through similar emotions again and again. For example, a child with autism may take pleasure in running from one part of the house to another or counting one to ten repeatedly. On the contrary, children who do not suffer from autism don’t like repetitive behaviors because they see them as weird (Wendy & Lauren, 2005, pp 23). Children with autism also talk about things that don’t make sense at all. In addition, children without autism are more adaptable to changes in routine and procedures. Wendy and Lauren, (2005) state that, such children have a good intellectual development which enables them to adapt to changes in activities and procedures. For example, a child without autism will enjoy bathing and brushing teeth before going to bed if even the child is used to brushing teeth first before bathing. Children with autism will react badly to such changes and this will leave the children very upset and this could affect the children’s quality of life (Wendy & Lauren, 2005, pp 28). This shows that children with autism suffer from poor intellectual growth which interferes with their social behaviors.
In addition, children with autism find it difficult to understand the feelings of other people in the society (Tony, 2006, pp 45). This makes it hard for such children to show empathy for other people undergoing stressful moments in life. However, when children with autism are reminded about their feelings to other people, their empathy may improve greatly. Due to their poor intellectual development, children with autism do not communicate well. In fact when engaging in a conversation with children with autism, the conversation may tend to be one-way talk. According to Tony, (2006), children with autism tend to give an impression that they are involved in the conversation rather than fully involved in the conversation. Such children may love a particular topic of discussion but on the contrary give out very little ideas about the topic. Children with autism will enjoy talking more about themselves rather that talking about other issues (Tony, 2006, pp 45). This shows that children with autism have poor intellectual development which also has effects on their social skills.
Another reason why children with autism have poor social skills is because they experience slow intellectual development and therefore they do not see any significance of socializing with other people well (Stephen, 2009, pp 131). In addition, children with autism cannot understand what they hear and see and this makes it hard for them to imprint on the voices and faces of other people in the society. This affects the social skills of children with autism. In addition, due to their poor development, the brains of children with autism cannot arrange and divide the rapid reactions linked with diverse sensations. Such children will also encounter challenges when trying to suitably respond to outside stimulation. For example, some children with autism may repeatedly want to hug other people without understanding the significance of their actions. Other children with autism may also exhibit recurrent discomforts which are shown by their unmanageable behaviors (Stephen, 2009, pp 131). Such behaviors indicate lack of intellectual development rather than social difficulties for children with autism.
Moreover, children with autism experience poor intellectual development because they are deprived of many of the learning practices that take place via sensory experiences (Lynn, 2009, pp 13). Fredericks, (2006) states that, children with autism are not able to comprehend what is taking place around them. For example, they are unable to learn by observing the behaviors of other people in the society and this makes it hard for them to model what they cannot understand. As a result, children with autism do not role play like the normal children or copy the behaviors of other people in the society. Instead, they will create their own language through the use of repetitive motions. The incapability to learn through imitation retards the intellectual and social development of children with autism (Fredericks, 2006, pp 123). In this connection, children with autism experience poor intellectual development and social skills.
In addition, children with autism experience lack of self-awareness (Catherine at al, 2006, pp 78). Children without autism can look at the mirror and identify their faces and other body parts. However, children with autism lack self-awareness and therefore they will not be able to identify their body parts in front of a mirror. Children with autism may also show funny behaviors such as laughing when they are sad because they cannot understand themselves well. In addition, children with autism may find it hard to understand whether some parts of their bodies such as the hands are part of them. This can be associated to the child’s poor intellectual development. Moreover, autistic children experience challenges with activities which involve their fine and gross motor growth (Catherine at al, 2006, pp 78). Fine motor skills are required for the use of colors and drawing. On the other hand, gross motor skills are required for running and walking. These challenges cause intellectual difficulties for children with autism.
Children with autism also have narrow interests and extraordinary abilities. For example, some of these children may be in a position to give in-depth monologue about a certain topic which they are interested in (Gianluca & Paola, 2009, pp 13). Others may show advanced abilities to do calculations or play music. This means that they will have a unique intellectual development when compared to children without autism. It is also evident that children with autism have poor intellectual development because they have good memories in the things they have seen or heard. Unlike the normal children who will even memorize things they have created, children with autism will only have good memories for the things they have heard from other people or seen in their compounds. Moreover, children with autism will find difficulties in using nonverbal language such as pointing to things. They simply encounter communication challenges because they are unable to make their wishes known to other people. These poor social skills can be attributed to poor brain development which affects the children’s intellectual skills (Gianluca & Paola, 2009, pp 13).
Conclusion
Children with autism experience both intellectual and social challenges. Intellectual challenges for children with autism include reading challenges, creativity, understanding and solving problems. Due to these intellection challenges, children with autism encounter social skills. Social skills depend on an individual’s intellectual development. As a result, children with poor intellectual development will find it hard to socialize with other people in the society. Such children do not understand the significance of what is happening around them in the society. As a result, they tend to remain withdrawn while other normal children interact with one another. Children with autism experience social challenges because of their impaired intellectual development. In this connection, it is true to say that children with autism experience poor intellectual growth which results to social challenges.
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