No Mention of the Environment in the New Study on the Rising Autism Rate in California

I wanted to post a bit more about the new study on California's rise in autism, as my post yesterday was a bit short (it was finished, and posted, via an iPhone---I was on the train and my laptop's battery was drained, and NJ Transit does not seem to have any power sources to use).

The main point I wish to communicate, in the event that you hear about the study, is that what the actual study says and how some are talking about it in press releases and elsewhere on the web is different, perhaps strikingly. The study itself looks specifically at the the data for autism rates in California, to determine how various factors (changes in diagnostic criteria, younger age at diagnosis, and differential migration) have contributed to the increase in the autism rate, which has increased everywhere in the past decade, and sevenfold or even eightfold in California (which I always have an eye on, as I'm from there----from Oakland and Berkeley). For an evaluation of the study by a scientist, see the Neurologica blog by Dr. Steven Novella, an academic clinical neurologist at Yale University School of Medicine.

On the other hand, if you go out on the web and read what's being said about the study, you'll see that there's an emphasis on something that's not actually mentioned in the text of the study (which, my laptop being powerless, was read by me again and again while on the train)---namely, on "environment." As Dr. Novella writes, there's a "disconnect" between the "appropriately conservative conclusion" of the study's lead researcher, Dr. Irva Hertz-Picciotto, and various statements she has made to the press, such as

“It’s time to start looking for the environmental culprits responsible for the remarkable increase in the rate of autism in California."

The word "environmental" does not occur in the actual text of the study, which rather refers to the need to examine "other artifacts" in determining the causes of autism. What is meant by these "artifacts" is not spelled out in the actual study, and it might be wished that researchers and the media and all of us let the study's findings be considered on their own terms, before jumping in about additional factors, including "the environment." If you've followed studies and speculation about the causes of autism for some time, you are quite aware that "something in the environment" is often held up as a potential, if not leading, cause of autism----which is probably why there's a lot of reading between the lines going on out there.

Reading with care is more than applicable here.

California county map image from County Map Digital Topo Maps