SAP: The Berlin company supports or exploits autistic programmers?

When German software giant SAP said last month it plans to employ hundreds of autistic people as IT experts, the news was welcomed especially at a small Berlin computer consulting firm.

The pioneering company, Auticon, already employs 17 people who live with autism, the disorder characterised by difficulties with social interactions and exceptional abilities in specific fields.

Mueller-Remus

"Many people say that if a company like SAP said it makes sense... it's very good for us," said its chief Dirk Mueller-Remus. "That means it's something serious, solid."

SAP, which makes business software, said in May that after pilot projects in India and Ireland, it plans to employ hundreds of people with autism as software testers and programmers.

Its goal is that by 2020, people with autism will make up one percent of its worldwide workforce of 65,000.

Mueller-Remus created his far smaller company in November 2011 with the idea of "investing in the strengths" of these potential employees.

His son was diagnosed with Asperger syndrome, a variant of autism, as a teenager, and Mueller-Remus has long known that many people with autism excel in fields like programming or quality control.

"This is my talent," one of the employees, 27-year-old Melanie Altrock, stated matter of factly, sitting at her screen in a white-walled, modern top-floor office in western Berlin.

"Other people are interested in languages or math, for me it's computers. I don't just search for errors, I see them."

Auticon now has 25 staff and offices in Berlin, Munich and Duesseldorf, with plans for another in Hamburg. It looks to break even "by the end of the year", said Mueller-Remus.

"We wanted a normal consulting company, without subsidies, without donations, without funding from a foundation," he said, adding that the aim was to "combine social commitment and business".

"Today, after a little over a year, we have good customers like Vodafone, it's looking good," said Mueller-Remus.

But he also emphasised that working with autistic people can be "a very complex issue".

"We can make many mistakes because people with Asperger are very demanding people," he said.

"People with autism are very concrete, unequivocal," added Elke Seng, a "job coach" at Auticon who assists the employees in their relationships at work and with clients.

"There is no innuendo, there is only one or zero. It's rather nice," she smiled.

Friedrich Nolte, board member of the Federal Association for the Development of People with Autism, said "only five to 10 percent of people affected by autism find a place on the regular job market".

Mueller-Remus said that "their CVs often have brief episodes of work interspersed with long interruptions".

Often people with autism "have no situational awareness, may seem arrogant, have no interest in small talk, and are not interested in people because people are not logical," he said.

All of this can give rise to misunderstandings with sometimes serious consequences, he said.

In this context, the SAP initiative was widely applauded at the small company.

"That more people with autism can access a job is simply fantastic," said Seng, who confessed she finds her work "fascinating".

An autism specialist, psychiatrist Kai Vogeley of Cologne University Hospital, told a German medical journal that people with autism who work can "develop confidence in themselves".

He cautioned however that "certain conditions must be met for this to succeed".

"I hope that SAP knows how difficult it is," said Mueller-Remus. "If things are done well, you can really achieve great results."

Altrock, the autistic programmer, agreed.

"I have a full-time job, I take pleasure in it, I earn my own money and I have my own apartment," she said. "I'm glad it's like that."

New Apps for Autism and/or Asperger’s

Over the past several weeks and months, we have received a number of requests for apps to help children and adults on the autism spectrum

So, we thought that this week’s article might be a good vehicle for providing our readers with an answer to these many requests.

What is new in the world of apps for autism /Asperger’s? We hope you will find a few new resources here to tap into for yourself or for the person in your life challenged with an autism-spectrum disorder.

Please tell us what you think of these apps when you have had an opportunity to try them. We would love to receive your valuable input!

New Apps for Autism/Asperger’s
Autism Apps for iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad---FREE (Updated: Jan 10, 2013)
Educational Autism Apps is simply a comprehensive list of apps that are being used with and by people diagnosed with autism, Down syndrome and other special needs.

It also includes links to any available information that can be found for each app. The Apps are also separated into over 30 categories, and the descriptions are all searchable, so any type of app is easy to find and download.

CLICK HERE

Autism Apps from Autism Speaks (for Android & Apple)
Long list of autism apps that provides app titles, platform compatibilities, prices, content categories and online app access (click links), an excellent online resource from a most reputable organization.

CLICK HERE

MySocius Model by BehaviorApp - MySocius is an iPhone and iPad app designed for parents who want to help their child with autism communicate.

This app uses evidence based, Naturalistic Teaching Procedures that “embeds teaching within the activities of everyday life.” Naturalistic Teaching Procedures have proved to be effective in clinical practice.

Price: $24.99 (Expensive, but for what it claims to provide, only you can decide if it's worth the price.)

CLICK HERE

Autism Apps List from the TCI Tech Review Blog

Short list of Apple-compatible autism apps from last half of 2012 to January 2013.

Individual reviews provide pricing, summaries, iTunes access links and more.

(All have prices that are from $1.99 to $99.00)

CLICK HERE

For more information on sensory-appealing reading tools:
www.FocusandRead.com Tools for struggling readers of all ages!
www.BrennanInnovators.com Info & support for struggling readers

Specialist Teachers Borrow From Brain Studies

In a corner of a classroom at the Ivymount School, a frustrated 7th grader tells himself to take a deep breath. Slowly, without distracting his classmates, he calms down.

This exercise is among many strategies derived from brain-science research that educators at this private school are using with students with disabilities. In this case, the technique is being taught to students with Asperger syndrome, for whom self-control in a moment of frustration can be elusive.

The five steps to regaining calm—including breathing deeply, reading directions, and telling oneself to give something a try—are taped to many of the desks of students in the Model Asperger Program.

Ivymount is one of a growing number of schools trying to adapt techniques based on brain research to special education settings, a practice that many teachers and parents may not have even envisioned a few years ago.


While some educators remain skeptical, brain research is slowly migrating from the lab into the classroom, both in predicting which students may have learning difficulties and intervening to help students diagnosed with disabilities.

Opportunities Emerge

Among the efforts under way:

• In Cambridge, Mass., a Harvard University center is devoted to training those who want to use neuroscience and cognitive science to improve teaching, including for students with disabilities.
• In Washington, George Washington University has created a doctoral program in applied neuroscience in special education.
• The Center for Applied Technology, in Wakefield, Mass., employs specialists in neuropsychology, along with other experts, to expand learning opportunities for students with disabilities.
• A professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology is using brain-imaging to predict which children in a given kindergarten class might eventually struggle with reading, because of dyslexia or other reasons, so intervention can take place as early as possible.

"We are just beginning to understand how big this is," said Maxine B. Freund, a professor in George Washington's department of special education and the associate dean of research and external relations. "It's an opportunity we treasure."

That's especially so for students with disabilities, said Kurt W. Fischer, a Harvard professor of psychology and human development and the founder of the graduate school of education's Mind, Brain, and Education program.

"What we need to do is figure out how to harness those differences instead of making everyone learn the same way," he said.

That doesn't mean there shouldn't still be some caution about translating brain research into educational techniques, he said.

"There are people that are skeptical, and they ought to be skeptical," Mr. Fischer said. "There are lots of things happening," he added, but "it's still early."

Turning a Corner

At MIT, neuroscientist and professor John D.E. Gabrieli has been working on using brain imaging to predict which students may eventually struggle with reading. He is clear about connecting his research with the classroom.

One of his current projects involves working with about 20 Boston-area kindergarten classes in inner-city charter schools, suburban district-run schools, and Roman Catholic schools.

As many students as possible are brought to his lab for brain imaging—through the use of noninvasive functional magnetic-resonance imaging, or FMRIS—and the students get additional help based on the results.

Mr. Gabrieli will follow the students for several years to see if the targeted interventions can stave off reading problems.

"How to diagnose and classify children—the more that we can make that scientific and less arbitrary, the better," he said. "If something about the brain—the luck of the draw of their brain—is making reading extra hard for them, maybe we could just intervene early and spare them a lot of grief."

Typically, reading problems aren't diagnosed until students are in 3rd or 4th grade. Not only do reading problems at that age hamper students' ability to learn many subjects, they've lost hours of reading practice outside of school, essentially falling even further behind, Mr. Gabrieli said.

Children who enjoy reading passively hone their skills by reading for pleasure, something poor readers are less likely to do.

One research-based product that already appears to be helping some students is based on existing practices in special education.

Using BrainWare Safari, software made by Learning Enhancement Corp., based in Chicago, students play what seems like a video game for 30 to 45 minutes a day, several times a week, for three months.

The exercises build students' memory skills, their visual- and auditory-processing skills, thinking abilities, and sensory integration, said Betsy Hill, the president and chief operating officer of Learning Enhancement.


The program replicates the work of speech and language therapists, vision therapists, and psychologists, work that is tedious for both students and therapists.

Different exercises require students to click to a beat and deal with other distractions that can compete for what's known as the working memory.

Working memory allows students to do things like take notes at the same time the teacher is talking—a skill not all students easily master.

"Kids are doing one level of an exercise 100, 200, 300 times," Ms. Hill said. "You need that kind of repetition to change those neuropathways."

While students with disabilities may need to spend more time with the software for their brains to be reprogrammed, in a sense, all students have been shown to benefit, she said.

One small study in the 550-student Harbor Beach community school district in Michigan, conducted by a district speech-language pathologist without Learning Enhancement's knowledge, showed students' average improvement on cognitive tests was three years and one month in learning progress after using the program for 12 weeks, confirming results published in a scientific journal.

The district was one of the first users of the program, now in about 300 schools across the country.

Harbor Beach was so convinced of BrainWare Safari's effectiveness, it is now required for all 3rd grade students new to the district.

ADHD and Teenagers: How to Talk to Anyone! - Leil Lowndes

This book was primarily written for business users and sales staff to help them network but it is equally relevant to teenagers with ADHD, Asperger's and younger people who have difficulties understanding social skills and therefore, in forming relationships.

It can also help young people who are trying to get into more social circles and the job market.

Asperger Syndrome and Depression - Swedish Research

University and hospital researchers in Sweden are publishing a new study in the September 2011 issue of Research in Developmental Disabilities that raises critical awareness particularly for adult patients living with Asperger Syndrome.

As Lugnegard, Hallerback, and Gillberg report, much less research has been published for adult patients of normal intelligence dealing with autism spectrum disorders and/or Asperger Syndrome (AS).

They conducted a study of 54 willing adults with a clinical diagnosis of AS. About half were women. Their report details the varied clinical backgrounds of these participants who averaged the age of 27. Interestingly, 52% of the group received their AS diagnosis in their late teens or later.

Highlighted Results

Lugnegard et al report:

• 70% had experienced at least one episode of major depression (and about half of those had recurrent major depression, and five met criteria for bipolar II disorder);
• 56% met criteria for at least one anxiety disorder, some with two or more. Various aspects of anxiety were commented including: social anxiety disorder (SAD), generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), panic disorder, agoraphobia, and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD);
• Two met criteria for psychosis;
• 13% had experienced recurrent hallucinations (primarily auditory) without other signs of psychosis;
• 4% had bulimia nervosa;
• 11% had previous substance dependence disorder;
• 30% had been given an earlier diagnosis of attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD); and
• 2% had been diagnosed with Tourette Syndrome.

Socio-economic and gender differences did not appear to influence the observed results.

What Is Major Depression?

The U.S. National Center for Biotechnology offers these possible symptoms of depression:

• Agitation, restlessness, and irritability;
• Dramatic change in appetite, often with weight gain or loss;
• Very difficult to concentrate;
• Fatigue and lack of energy;
• Feelings of hopelessness and helplessness;
• Feelings of worthlessness, self-hate, and guilt;
• Becoming withdrawn or isolated;
• Loss of interest or pleasure in activities that were once enjoyed;
• Thoughts of death or suicide;
• Trouble sleeping or excessive sleeping; and
• Depression can appear as anger and discouragement, rather than feelings of sadness.

What Can Be Learned Here?

The Swedish report reads like a call to action for depression awareness with AS. They point out how "strikingly high" the rate of lifetime major depression was observed in young adults with AS and how these results align with their clinical experience treating "hundreds of individuals with AS."

The research team mentions that no previous studies have focused on AS adults experiencing anxiety disorders. Various scenarios and social interactions are discussed that may explain how AS patients can be impacted or even disabled by related fears, e.g., fears of some social situations or even fears of the perceptions by others of their AS behaviours.

Read more at Suite101: New Research: Asperger Syndrome and Depression

Creativity and Art therapy

The idea that people with Asperger's, autism and dyslexia might be gifted in mathematics or engineering or mechanical pursuits may be difficult to reconcile by many but the suggestion that some people with autism might be creative or artistic should make intuitive sense.

A new study of 'divergent thinking' i.e. the ability to generate a variety of new solutions to a problem, in people with brain damage hints at why some individuals with autism and dyslexia may be highly creative.

Though this is one of the first scientific studies to address the phenomenon of creativity in people with autism, it adds some scientific support to articles in the popular press that posthumously diagnose autism in long-dead thinkers and artists.

A 2004 book, Autism and Creativity, kicked off this trend by alleging that Einstein, Freud, Wittgenstein and the artist Andy Warhol would all probably merit a diagnosis of Asperger syndrome or high-functioning autism.

Other researchers have made similar claims about Warhol, the composer Bartok, the poet William Butler Yeats and other luminaries.

Some individuals with autism are also credited with 'visionary art,' created by those who have never received formal training and who may suffer from neuro-psychiatric diseases.

Roger Cardinal, who coined the term 'outsider art' in 1972, discussed six case histories of talented visual artists with varying degrees of autism in a 2009 article. Some of their work is highly lauded and hangs in museums today.

In the midst of this, how do we reconcile the 'insistence on sameness' characteristic of autism with the kind of divergent thinking that defines creativity?

In the new study, researchers showed 40 people with lesions in different regions of the brain pictures of 30 circles drawn on a sheet of paper. They gave each participant five minutes to draw as many pictures as they could of meaningful objects incorporating one of the circles.

Participants with damage to the left hemisphere, which is responsible for language processing, turned out to be more creative than healthy controls, producing more pictures in various designs. By contrast, people with damage to the medial prefrontal cortex, a right hemisphere region involved in planning and decision-making, are less creative than healthy controls.

The researchers speculate that the deterioration of language abilities in people with left hemisphere brain damage opens up possibilities of non-linear, divergent thinking i.e. creativity. Though the study did not include individuals with Asperger's or autism, language impairments associated with some forms of the disorder might produce a similar effect.

The experience of a 15-year-old Oklahoma girl diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome at age 8 shows that art can also be therapeutic. Before one of her teachers handed her a paintbrush, Amanda had trouble concentrating on her school work and connecting with her peers.

Art helped her focus and express herself, her mother told a reporter. Her paintings are beautiful and received a great deal of positive attention from her parents, teachers and the community at large. "Art was probably the best thing that ever happened to Amanda," her mother said. "It just changed everything about our life."

Hans Asperger - Who Was He?

Hans Asperger - Who Was He?

One of the cooler aspects of discovering a new syndrome or disease, aside from making medical history, is that you get to name the disease after yourself. In the case of Asperger’s Syndrome (AS), the name is derived from Hans Asperger, an Austrian pediatrician, Feb. 18, 1906 - Oct. 21, 1980. Hans Asperger was a prolific writer, penning over 300 publications, most of them to do with autism in children.

Uninterested Classmates

Asperger was born to a farming family in the rural town of Hausbrunn, which lies on the outskirts of Vienna, Austria. The eldest of two boys, as a youngster he had a talent for languages and liked to quote the poet Franz Grillparzer to his uninterested classmates.

Quoted Himself

Some say that Asperger exhibited many of the tendencies of the syndrome he so well described. Hans found it hard to make friends and was seen as somewhat introverted. He was known to refer to himself in the third person and would often quote his own words.

He studied medicine in Vienna, becoming a doctor of medicine in 1931. Asperger practiced at Vienna’s University Children’s Hospital. In 1935 Dr. Asperger married and went on to father 5 children.

Toward the end of World War II Asperger served as a medical officer in Croatia. His younger brother perished in The Battle of Stalingrad.

After the publication of Asperger’s landmark paper on autism symptoms in 1944, he was given a tenured position at the University of Vienna. Just after the war ended, he was made the director of a children’s clinic in that city. 

Asperger was appointed chair of pediatrics at the university and served in that position for 2 decades. He later took a position in Innsbruck. In 1964 he agreed to head the SOS-Kinderdorf in Hinterbrühl, becoming professor emeritus in 1977.

Dr. Asperger first wrote up his definition of Asperger’s syndrome in 1944 but his work was little recognized during his lifetime. This is due to the fact that his work was in German and translations were rare. The first paper to mention Asperger’s Syndrome was published in 1981 by Lorna Wing, a British researcher. 

Wing’s paper on the subject, Asperger's syndrome: a clinical account, served as a challenge to the accepted model of autism as presented by Leo Kanner in 1943.

Once Asperger’s findings began to be translated into English in 1989, the English-speaking world sat up and took note. At that point, his findings gained notice and Asperger’s syndrome received recognition as a diagnosis.

Asperger had identified a certain pattern of behaviors and special abilities in four boys which he called “autistic psychopathy.” This pattern of behavior included, "a lack of empathy, little ability to form friendships, one-sided conversations, intense absorption in a special interest, and clumsy movements." 

Asperger spoke of children with AS as "little professors" because they could speak on a favourite topic in great detail.

Dr. Asperger believed that these children would make use of their special talents when they reached adulthood. One of the children, Fritz V., later became a professor of astronomy and managed to solve an error in Newton’s work that he had noticed in his childhood.

Dr. Hans Asperger

Perhaps the most striking aspect of Asperger’s work is his positive description of Asperger’s syndrome which is striking in comparison to Leo Kanner’s depressing description of autism. Asperger’s syndrome is considered a higher-functioning form of autism.

The original publication of this blog can be found here

A Personal YouTube Video: i am dyslexic

ok this has taken a lot of curage to uplod i cept puting it of however i got another comment on my aporling spelling so i thort that i need to explain, not for simpethy but for understanding and to spred the nowlage of the dificultys faced by many people who are dyslexic.

i was diagnosed as being saverly dysleixc at the age of 8 and had a re diagnose last summer that comfermed that i am still savialy dysleic, the saverity of someones dysleixa is not yust a test to see how well someone can reed or spell it is a test to mesher up someones inteligence agast a persons reading, spelling and short term memary, so if someone had aporling spelling, reeding and sort tearm memary but the IQ was above average then they are the ones with siverar dyslexia, inother words we are not thik!!! thanks for woching and spred the word dyseliax deosn't = stupidaty!!!

Katie

Asperger's syndrome: Extradition a breach of Human Rights?

Gary McKinnon will be extradited to the United States on computer hacking charges

Computer hacker Gary McKinnon could be sent to the US within weeks after the Home Secretary refused to block his extradition.

Alan Johnson finally dashed hopes that the Government would intervene in the case, insisting there was no evidence that the extradition would breach Mr McKinnon's human rights.

Mr McKinnon's mother, Janis Sharp, said ministers should "hang their heads in shame" for the "barbaric" decision.

His legal team is to apply for a judicial review within days, but Ms Sharp warned that if that was not granted then her son could be extradited by Christmas.

Mr McKinnon, who has Asperger's syndrome, faces up to 60 years in jail for hacking into Pentagon computers soon after the 9/11 terror attacks. He says he was looking for evidence of UFOs.

He and his family, who have led a high-profile campaign to block the extradition, were given hope last month when Mr Johnson agreed to study new medical evidence. The Home Secretary's deliberations came after the High Court refused the 43-year-old permission to appeal to the Supreme Court against his removal.

But Mr Johnson said in a statement: "I have carefully considered the representations in the case of Gary McKinnon. I am clear that the information is not materially different from that placed before the High Court earlier this year and does not demonstrate that sending Mr McKinnon to the United States would breach his human rights.

"As the courts have affirmed, I have no general discretion. If Mr McKinnon's human rights would be breached, I must stop the extradition. If they would not be breached, the extradition must go ahead."

Mr McKinnon's family say that his health has deteriorated significantly under the pressure of the pending extradition and fears about how he will be treated by the US authorities. There are fears that he may even commit suicide.

Ms Sharp said: "To force a peaceful, vulnerable, misguided UFO fanatic like Gary thousands of miles away from his much-needed support network is barbaric. This is a cruel and miserable decision. If the severity of Gary's medical condition isn't sufficient to prevent his extradition, I can't imagine what is. God help others facing a similar fate. I'm so upset and angry."