Autism By Temple Grandin Quotes & Sayings

In fact, there are autism clusters, you know, around some of the big tech centers. You take two socially awkward computer programmers and put them together, that can kind of concentrate the autistic genes. — Temple Grandin

I've worked with tons of people that I know who are on the spectrum - but now I think severe autism has really increased. — Temple Grandin

I can explain how a person with autism thinks. I am very, very interested in how people think. It's been a gradual process of learning more and more about how my thinking process is different. You know it's bottom up - you take specific examples to make concepts and then I put them in categories. — Temple Grandin

I believe there is a reason such as autism, severe manic-depression, and schizophrenia remain in our gene pool even though there is much suffering as a result. — Temple Grandin

The world needs all types of minds. — Temple Grandin

One big question that's come up is: Has autism increased on the mild side of things? I don't think so - they've always been here. Some of this is increased detection. — Temple Grandin

My life - autism's an important part of it, but it bothers me when I see kids where autism and their autism is the only thing they think about. I'd rather have them think about, you know, some art work they were gonna do or some science they wanted to do. — Temple Grandin

Label-locked thinking can affect treatment. For instance, I heard a doctor say about a kid with gastrointestinal issues, "Oh, he has autism. That's the problem" - and then he didn't treat the GI problem. — Temple Grandin

Half of Silicon Valley's got a little bit of autism. — Temple Grandin

Mild autism can give you a genius like Einstein. If you have severe autism, you could remain nonverbal. You don't want people to be on the severe end of the spectrum. But if you got rid of all the autism genetics, you wouldn't have science or art. All you would have is a bunch of social 'yak yaks.' — Temple Grandin

One of the places where research is needed is all the sensory problems. And you get sensory problems not just with autism, but with dyslexia, learning problems, ADHD, attention deficit, you know, things like sound sensitivity, problems with fluorescent lighting. — Temple Grandin

I strongly recommend that students with autism get involved in special interest clubs in some of the areas they naturally excel at. Being with people who share your interests makes socializing easier. — Temple Grandin

I was nonverbal until I was four years old. Back in the 50s, I was the kind of kid they used to just put away in an institution. But then you get the milder autism where there's no speech delay, but they're socially awkward. Those kids were around when I was a child. They were just called geeks and nerds. — Temple Grandin

I'm seeing too many kids where they get fixated on their own autism. I'd rather have them get fixated that they like programming computers or they like art or they want to sing in the church choir or they want to train dogs, you know, something that they can turn into a career. — Temple Grandin

In an ideal world the scientist should find a method to prevent the most severe forms of autism but allow the milder forms to survive. After all, the really social people did not invent the first stone spear. It was probably invented by an Aspie who chipped away at rocks while the other people socialized around the campfire. Without autism traits we might still be living in caves. — Temple Grandin

The word "autism" still conveys a fixed and dreadful meaning to most people - they visualize a child mute, rocking, screaming, inaccessible, cut off from human contact. And we almost always speak of autistic children, never of autistic adults, as if such children never grew up, or were somehow mysteriously spirited off the planet, out of society. — Temple Grandin

Autism is a neurological disorder. It's not caused by bad parenting. It's caused by, you know, abnormal development in the brain. The emotional circuits in the brain are abnormal. And there also are differences in the white matter, which is the brain's computer cables that hook up the different brain departments. — Temple Grandin

My Advice is: You always have to keep persevering. — Temple Grandin

From a scientific standpoint, Aspergers and autism are one syndrome. Aspergers is part of the autism spectrum, not a separate disorder. — Temple Grandin

Autism is part of who I am. — Temple Grandin

Autism's an important part of who I am, but I'm a college professor and an animal scientist first. And I wouldn't want to change 'cause I like the logical way I think. — Temple Grandin

I've always thought of myself as a cattle-handling specialist, a college professor first; autism is secondary. — Temple Grandin

What would happen if the autism gene was eliminated from the gene pool?
You would have a bunch of people standing around in a cave, chatting and socializing and not getting anything done. — Temple Grandin

The worst thing you can do is nothing. (re: teaching children with autism) — Temple Grandin

It is never too late to expand the mind of a person on the autism spectrum. — Temple Grandin

If by some magic, autism had been eradicated from the face of the Earth, then men would still be socializing in front of a wood fire at the entrance to a cave. — Temple Grandin

You take somebody - one person has definitely got autism, you got another person that maybe has some of those traits and maybe there's some anxiety, depression, some epilepsy or something in the family history. Put them together, you're more likely to have a severely autistic kid than if you don't have any neurological problems in the family history. — Temple Grandin

Sometimes we forget about common sense. Autism is used too much as an excuse for bad behavior. — Temple Grandin

There tends to be a lot of autism around the tech centers ... when you concentrate the geeks, you're concentrating the autism genetics. — Temple Grandin

I think that the definition of autism is too broad. You got to remember, autism definition is a behavioral profiling. — Temple Grandin

Steve Jobs was probably mildly on the autistic spectrum. Basically, you've probably known people who were geeky and socially awkward but very smart. When does geeks and nerds become autism? That's a gray area. Half the people in Silicon Valley probably have autism. — Temple Grandin

Autism is an extremely variable disorder. — Temple Grandin

Some people with autism who don't talk, all they hear are vowel sounds. Like if I said 'cup,' they might just hear 'uh.' — Temple Grandin

There are no files in my memory that are repressed,' she asserted. 'You have files that are blocked. I have none so painful that they're blocked. There are no secrets, no locked doors - nothing is hidden. I can infer that there are hidden areas in other people, so that they can't bear to talk of certain things. The amygdala locks the files of the hippocampus. In me, the amygdala doesn't generate enough emotion to lock the files of the hippocampus. — Oliver Sacks

Let's get into talking about how autism is similar animal behavior. The thing is I don't think in a language, and animals don't think in a language. It's sensory based thinking, thinking in pictures, thinking in smells, thinking in touches. It's putting these sensory based memories into categories. — Temple Grandin

Who do you think made the first stone spears? The Asperger guy. If you were to get rid of all the autism genetics, there would be no more Silicon Valley. — Temple Grandin