I've done a lot of research, and I still cannot see why Autistic children tend to be unremorsely violent?

Question

Does anyone know why they hurt others and don't sow any sadness at their pain? Why they seem to enjoy making animals and humans bleed and be in pain? I'm not criwicizing, I know they have problems, I just want to understand better. I have a friend with such a child.

Answer 1

Autistic children have no emotion whatsoever for the outside world...they love their parents in their own way, but only exist in their own minds...they dont understand emotion at all....they cant sympathize because their world is inside their heads

Answer 2

Although some children with autism have violent behaviors, there are many do not.

In my experience, it seems like the majority of this behavior that I have seen from my students is due to a lack of being able to communicate what they want or a difficulty in expressing their feelings of frustration. I think that a teaching a non-verbal child an alternate communication system (such as Picture Exchange Communication System or PECS) while on the road to teaching him or her to speak can do wonders.

However, the only way to discover why a person does a certain behavior or type of behavior is to look at the what the child "gets" from performing the behavior. Make clear and objective descriptions of the behaviors that are concerning you. Then, make some notes whenever the behavior occurs. You could make a chart with three columns: (A) What happens before the behavior, (B) What the behavior was, and (C) What happened after or as a result of the behavior.

You may find that it gets him or her attention from adults, or that it gets him or her a time-out (maybe he is overwhelmed in the situation and wants to be removed). If you see a pattern from the information you collect, you could teach him other ways to get attention or whatever he is gaining from doing these behaviors. These could include, tapping someone on the shoulder, asking for attention, handing someone a card that says, "attention please" or "all done" (to get permission to leave an area), etc. Also, make sure that you are giving him praise or a reinforcer (something he likes) ONLY when he is engaging in positive behavior.

To find out more about this technique, I would suggest speaking to your school district's autism specialist, if they have one, or special education teachers (if your son is in school). It is called "functional analysis."

Best of luck and I hope this helps you!

Answer 3

They really don't understand much or get really frustrated over not understanding. Especially when they are young. My Mom worked at a methodist school and she had 1 autistic child. She spent time with each student and him alone and was calm and understanding. That child does not need special classes anymore because of the individual attention he recieved. I also suggest a reward system for him using his words and not causing violent fights. Make a prize box full of little prizes from the dollar store. Tell your friend I said good luck!

Answer 4

The brain of an Autistic child is under developed in most areas and over developed in some area, thus when a situation occurs that they do not understand it creates a chemical in-balance and they react in anger and frustration the only way they see how. I helped with raising triplets and two of them (which were identical) were Autistic, but the third brother was normal. They were very violent and you might notice that the inflict allot of bodily harm to themselves in allot of situations.

Answer 5

it is hard for an autistic child to have social interactions. They don't understand the world and people the way we do. One of the signs of autism is delayed social interaction and delayed language. They usually have little empathy which is why they don't understand when they hurt others. The world is an object to them, not an interaction. It is difficult to explain. Perspective taking and understanding someone else's view is an extreme challenge for those with autism. I hope that helped some!

Answer 6

Contrary to popular belief, not ALL autistic children have problems with social interactions and empathy, but it IS common. I just have to clarify, it irritates me when people say ALL, because my child is one that does not have these issues, to the extent that most people refer to. Their brain is damaged, and if you've ever known someone who has emerged from severe head trauma and was left injured for a short time, it's very common for them to be mean, aggressive, and self-centered. It's like this with MOST autistic children, only it's not temporary. Boys will be more aggressive than girls, due to the testosterone, from what I've read. As to making animals bleed, that sounds more along the lines of something else, either issues dealing with bipolar or oppositional defiant disorder-ODD. Look that up, and see if it sounds like this child. It's very common for a child with autism to have more issues going on then just autism, and it needs to be kept in check. If it's something like the two I mentioned, it needs to be treated with medications, there's no way around it, because it's a severe chemical inbalance. But yes, the not showing sadness is characteristic of autism, because they do view the world differently than most children. Again, I disagree on ALL of them not knowing who their parents are, only because my child and the ones I know personally, don't have this issue. My child is extremely loving and very attached to our family, but he does have a little bit harder time relating to others. Not much, just a little, and usually with prompting, he can sort of relate, as much as any 4 yr old can! The only time he is violent is when he's in a rage, then he is prone to throwing things at us, or trying to hit us, in which case he is punished just like any other child. We don't tolerate it, we don't excuse it, but we understand that it is something that he can't COMPLETELY control, and are always in a process of TEACHING him how to control it to the best of his ability. Of course, we don't let on that we expect this behavior, because then he would run with that. We just use our knowledge as a means to keep from getting completely angry at him and taking it personally. He is growing up understanding that there are consequences to his actions, regardless of his reasons why he did it, because that's how society will treat him. Definitely get some info on the ODD and hand it to your friend, and encourage her to seek some more help, because the behaviors you mentioned go above and beyond anyone I've ever heard of in dealing strictly with autism, it sounds like there's more going on there. Oh,and my child does show remorse, after the fact, we're working on trying to get him to stop and think about his actions before he acts on them, and then reward him when he does handle a situation the correct way.

Answer 7

my sister in law has a autistic son who is now 6 yrs old! he was diagnosed with autism at age 2 and a half! im not really sure how bad his autism is but ive never seen him hurt any of his sisters or his younger brother and ive never seen him hurt their dog or cats! he kinda just plays by himself!

Answer 8

They do not see people as people, but objects.
When I took my daughter to pediatric neurologist to see if she had mild form of atutism (didn't , thank You Jesus!), the doc said that one sypmtom is they do not see parents/people as anything but objects to climb on, they do not make eye contact or say 'bye or hi'. [Almost like we are robots to serve needs, but not real? hmmm, I'm gonna think on that one.] My nephew is autistic, but he doesn't really hurt things, many many forms of autism. Actually he's very high funcioning.

Answer 9

no one really knows why autistic children react the way they do.. If they could figure that out. PPerhaps they could cure them.

Answer 10

They don't have to be. They choose to be. Think about it. Being a retard is like having a "beat people up for free" license.

I'm onto them though. When they come after me I just throw a piece of cake at them.

They all want cake.