Autism and divorce

Posted at 3:50 PM on May 19, 2010 by Bob Collins (2 Comments)
Filed under: Health

A study out today debunks the notion that autistic children lead to divorced parents.

'There really weren't any significant differences in terms of family structure when you consider children with autism and those without," said Brian Freedman, PhD, clinical director of the Center for Autism and Related Disorders at the Kennedy Krieger Institute in Baltimore.

Advocacy groups for autism have often quoted the 80-percent figure but nobody seems to know where it came from. There appear to have been no studies examining the divorce rate of parents of autistic children.

But there's been evidence that it's a made-up number. In a 2008 study, Easter Seals reported that only one-third of divorced parents of autistic children said the stress of a special needs child contributed to the end of the marriage.

Comments (2)

So if vaccines don't cause autism and autism doesn't cause divorce, then, what was the question?

Posted by Jim Hartmann | May 20, 2010 8:34 AM

I am so glad to hear this news. I've been told many times the rate was 80%. I didn't realize that number was fabricated. Thanks for bringing a bit of good news about autism.

Posted by Matt | May 28, 2010 6:05 PM

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