Host: What are some of the signs and symptoms to parents that their child may be affected with autism?

Peggy Halliday: Typically developing babies are very social. If they smile at you when you smile at them they initiate smiles, they turn their head when they hear their name called, they respond and become very familiar with their parents voice or their caregivers voice and children with autism do not smile as readily, they may not smile at all or just not as often as you would expect them to smile. They may not turn their head when they hear a parent s voice.

Typically developing babies also are extremely interested in other children and even before they get to the age where they can really play they are really noticing what is going on, whereas children with autism even infants are more self-contained often more interested in objects. The play when the play does start to develop is different, a child with the autism will not imitate as readily as other children, so the kinds of play that you would do with an infant like, paddy cake and how big are you, so big where the baby copies you a lot of times children with autism are not doing these things.

There are other signs and symptoms with a different type of autism called regressive autism, where up until 12 to 15 or 18 months of age the child develops normally and does start talking, does have some words, does have some social gestures, but suddenly or perhaps gradually these things go away and disappear, they may suddenly stop talking or just overtime parent notice, there are not saying those words that they were saying anymore and this regressive type of autism is a great cause for concern. Any of these, regression in skill should be a huge red flag to parent that something may be wrong.