Freaks, Geeks And Asperger's Syndrome By Luke Jackson

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Not being able to understand someone leads to Autistic children avoiding social interaction, however this leads to negative effects as well.
A lack of social interaction does not give children the socialization that they need to develop. Children with Autism have trouble understanding society and their peers. This impacts their cognitive abilities and brain development. The book “Freaks, Geeks, and Asperger’s Syndrome” is written by Luke Jackson, a thirteen year old boy who has Asperger’s Syndrome who describes his experience with the disorder. In his case, he said that staying quiet and isolated only increased the effects of the disorder. Isolation becomes a continuous cycle of being alone that can be hard to get out of. Also in the book it
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The study talked about how when children with ASD isolate themselves from other children growing up they do not get that social interaction that they need to develop social skills they will need when they are adults. This affects how successful they will be in life because our society depends on social interactions. Another study was done that looked at social skills training in children with Autism and how this benefitted them and compared results after to children who did not receive this training. The study concluded that “deficient socialization skills can lead to several secondary conditions for individuals with ASD, including depression, anxiety, and aggression” (Laugeson 2014). This means that because children are not getting the social interaction they need, they develop emotional and mental ailments as they develop into adults. Another problem is that children with ASD are more likely than normally functioning children to become peer victimized because of their difficulties socializing and communicating. Peer victimization is continued harassment of bullying and has been shown to cause future problems. These problems include detriments to development in social behavior as well as children becoming maladaptive (Ung 2016). Peer victimization can occur when peers of children with Autism do not understand them socially and this can stem from their troubles communicating and …show more content…
Competing in a sports event can serve as a good outlet to be competitive in a healthy setting. Also sports allow children to burn off some steam or anger that might have pent-up. This is important for children with Autism because they might have more difficulties expressing emotions than other children and sports can allow themselves to get out these emotions in an appropriate setting. A study was done on adolescents in Norway that analyzed children before and after a season on a soccer team. The children were ages twelve to fourteen and were psychologically tested after participating on the Norwegian soccer team to look at their overall mental health and emotional output. The study first focused on team sports and the psychological benefits of those. Team sports are based around collaborating with others and this social interaction provides a sense of belonging in children developing socially. The results of the study suggest that soccer being a team sport required collaboration between teammates which initiated social interaction. Along with this and feedback from peers and coaches being on the soccer team provided a place for the children to experience friendship and peer approval and to have a sense of belonging within the team through bonding with team mates (Tjomsland

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