Pop Culture And Autism Essay

Autism spectrum disorder and autism are both terms to describe a group of developmental disorders of the brain. These disorders are measured in varying degrees by difficulties in social interaction, communication and repetitive behaviors. There is no one type of autism, just like there is no one cause. Experts are still unsure about all the causes of autism, but it appears to be a combination of multiple circumstances. These circumstances include environmental, biological and genetic factors. In past decades, pop culture has created the belief of the possible link between autism and vaccinations, although this is not the case, why does this myth still persist in our culture?
Three major myths were proposed in this case. Many believed the combination measles-mumps-rubella vaccine caused autism. Others thought it was caused by the use of …show more content…
In 1999 a study was done in the United Kingdom to see if there was a link between the two. In this study, researchers compared children had had and had not gotten the measles, mumps and rubella vaccination. The study identified four hundred and ninety-eight cases of autism, including core autism, atypical autism and Asperger syndrome in children born in the United Kingdom since 1979. There was an increase in cases of autism by year of birth with no change after the introduction of the vaccination. There was also no age difference at diagnosis between the cases vaccinated before or after eighteen months of age, when the vaccination was distributed, and children that were never vaccinated. These results showed no temporal association between the onset of autism within one or two years after being vaccinated with MMR. In addition, developmental regression was not clustered in the months after vaccination. The data from these results does not support the connection between MMR and autism and if an association was to occur, it was so rare it could not be