A new major study has found that transgender and “gender-diverse adults” are six times more likely to be diagnosed with autism than the general population.
The recent research by scientists at the Autism Research Center of the University of Cambridge took data from more than 600,000 people and confirmed previous findings from smaller-scale studies of the same kind.
They combined five different datasets in which participants provided detailed information about their gender identity, autism diagnosis, as well as all other relevant diagnoses of mental health, such as depression, schizophrenia, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD).
Across all five datasets, transgender people were three to six times more likely to be diagnosed with autism than non-trans than non-gender-diverse people.
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The true figure is probably much higher because autism is typically underdiagnosed. An estimated 1.1 per cent of the UK population is on the autism spectrum, which would indicate that up to nine per cent of transgender and gender-diverse adults are likely to be autistic as well.
Transgender people were also found to be more than twice as likely to be diagnosed with depression. They also scored higher for autistic traits, on a questionnaire on non-clinical features of autism, despite their diagnosis of autism.
“This finding, with large datasets, confirms that the co-occurrence between being autistic and transgender and gender-diverse is robust,” Dr Varun Warrier, who led the study, said. Dr Warrier stressed that the co-occurrence of autism and transgenderism did not necessarily indicate a causal relationship.
The survey provoked a notable reaction on social media. Some doubt the language used by the authors of the study, claiming that the controversial topic was cannon fodder for awake warriors online. Others shared their own experiences and insights on the possible link between the autism spectrum and transgenderism.
Unfortunately, I find Simon Baron Cohen’s article almost incomprehensible, because he seems horrible to cancel when he dares to tell what percentage of respondents started life male to female, which of course is the big question.
– Steve Sailer (@Steve_Sailer) 11 August 2020
My son has ASD and my parental impression is that ASD children often struggle with managing conceptual ambiguity and puberty is even more disorienting for them than for “normal” adolescents.
– Michael F. Bird (@ mbird12) 11 August 2020
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