Two-Thirds of Kids With Autism Have Been Bullied: Study

March 30th, 2012

FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda

FRIDAY, March 30 (HealthDay News) — Nearly two-thirds of
American children with autism have been bullied at some point in their
lives, and these kids are bullied three times more often than their
siblings without autism, a new survey finds.

Bullying occurs in every grade but is worst in grades five through
eight, with 42 percent to 49 percent of autistic children in those grades
bullied, according to the survey of nearly 1,200 parents of autistic
children ages 6 to 15.

The Interactive Autism Network (IAN), a project of the Kennedy Krieger
Institute, conducted the survey.

“These survey results show the urgent need to increase awareness,
influence school policies and provide families and children with effective
strategies for dealing with bullying,” Paul Law, director of the IAN
Project, said in an institute news release.

Children with autism, a developmental disorder, usually have delayed
language development and difficulty with social interaction.

“Children with [autism] are already vulnerable. To experience teasing,
taunts, ostracism or other forms of spite may make a child who was already
struggling to cope become completely unable to function,” Law said. “The
issue is complex and we plan to carefully analyze the data and publish
peer-reviewed findings that will serve to advance policy and care for
individuals with [autism].”

Overall, 63 percent of kids with an autism spectrum disorder have been
bullied at some time, the survey found.

Children with autism in public schools are bullied nearly 50 percent
more often than those in private schools or special-education schools, the
researchers found.

Types of bullying experienced by autistic children include: being
teased, picked on or made fun of (73 percent); being ignored or left out
of things on purpose (51 percent); being called bad names (47 percent);
and being pushed, shoved, hit, slapped or kicked (30 percent).

Bullying is experienced by 57 percent of children with autism who want
to interact with others but have difficulty making friends, compared with
25 percent of those who prefer to play alone and 34 percent of those who
will play with others only if approached.

Fifty-two percent of the parents said their child had been taunted by
other children in order to trigger a meltdown or aggressive outburst.

Kids with Asperger’s syndrome, a high-functioning type of autism, were
nearly twice as likely as children with another autism disorder to be
bullied, perhaps because of different school placements, the researchers
said.

More information

The U.S. National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke has
more about autism.