What causes autism?
As researchers have worked to unravel t[autism’s] nature, they’ve come to grips with some unsatisfying facts. One is that it doesn’t even make sense to think of autism as a single, discrete condition.
On the whole, autism is characterized by difficulty in social interactions and communication. But the diagnosis of autism covers people with a huge range of behaviors and symptoms, which are often arranged along the autism spectrum.
These different forms of autism appear to be triggered by different, interacting causes. It’s not genetics or environment, but both — a combination of inherited genes, random genetic mutations, and environmental factors like a mother’s immune system and nutrition during pregnancy. In most cases, scientists still aren’t sure exactly how these factors actually lead to the disorder.
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