Autism: Making Progress

By Shilo Rea / 412-268-6094 / shilo [a] cmu (p) edu / and Jocelyn Duffy / 412-268-9982 / jhduffy [a] andrew.cmu (p) edu According to a 2014 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report, autism - a complex developmental disorder - will affect one out of every 68 children born in the United States. The lifetime cost to care for a child with autism is estimated to be as great as $2.4 million. But, while no single cause or cure has yet to be found, there is optimism as researchers - including several at Carnegie Mellon University - are making significant progress with groundbreaking discoveries that are being highlighted this April during National Autism Awareness Month. Marcel Just , the D.O. Hebb University Professor of Psychology in the Dietrich College of Humanities and Social Sciences , has been studying the disorder for 18 years. Just uses brain imaging to understand how brain processes support various kinds of human thought, specifically in autism. With his influential Frontal-Posterior Underconnectivity Theory of Autism , published in 2004, Just was the first to discover and explain that the synchronization of the activation between frontal and posterior brain areas is lower in autism. Since then, he has expanded that theory to include how the brain's white matter tracts - the cabling that connects separated brain areas - are altered in autism and how these alterations can affect brain function and behavior.