In 1998 my youngest brother, Kelton, was diagnosed with autism, a developmental disability that affects communication and social interaction. Autism currently affects 1/88 people in the United States. Kelton is a talented individual who runs cross-country and track, wrestles, plays the drums, loves history, and collects bobble heads and keychains.

This year Kelton decided to enroll in his first art class where he discovered his skill for drawing. His unorthodox style made me reconsider my artwork and examine the differences and similarities that exist between our perspectives. According to Paul Collins’ Not Even Wrong: Adventures in Autism, artists are four times more likely to have autism in their families. Considering the number of artists in my family, this statistic made me question the similarities that exist between Kelton and me. For this reason, we have decided to draw one of his 6,481 keychains a day for one year. These drawings will be as simple and uninhibited as possible. This project will explore our individual perspectives and examine the similarities that exist between us as artists.

Day 200!



A couple more blind contour drawings of Kelt's bobble heads. These drawings are blind except when I briefly look at the paper to set the pen. This series represents Kelt's uninhibited drawing style and enhanced visual skills. To view more, click the bobble head label to the right. This article further explains the project: U.S. Department of Health & Human Services.

Brains of People with Autism Focus More on Visual Skills

This means less activity in areas used for planning and decision making, but the brain adapts, researchers find.

MONDAY, April 4 (HealthDay News) -- The brains of people with autism concentrate more resources in areas devoted to visual perception, resulting in less activity in areas used to plan and control thoughts and actions, says a new study.

The findings may explain why people with autism have exceptional visual abilities, said the researchers at the University of Montreal.

They analyzed data from 26 brain imaging studies that were conducted over 15 years and included a total of 357 autistic and 370 non-autistic participants.

"Through this meta-analysis, we were able to observe that autistics exhibit more activity in the temporal and occipital regions and less activity in frontal cortex than non-autistics," first author Fabienne Samson said in a university news release.

The temporal and occipital regions are involved in perceiving and recognizing patterns and objects, while the frontal areas are involved with decision making, cognitive control, planning and execution, she explained.

The findings offer the "first physiological confirmation that enhanced perceptual processing is a core feature of neural organization in this population," Dr. Laurent Mottron, of the university's Centre for Excellence in Pervasive Development Disorders, said in the news release. "We now have a very strong statement about autism functioning, which may be ground for cognitive accounts of autistic perception, learning, memory and reasoning."

According to the study, the finding shows that the autistic brain successfully adapts some of its cognitive functioning by reallocating brain areas to visual perception. The results may point the way to new areas of autism research.

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