Regarding whether socially awkward parents are more likely to have children who are susceptible to environmental damage (and thus more likely to develop an ASD)... I just want to throw a few ideas out there:

(1) At least some of Kanner's patients were people of high levels of education and income, which could explain why they weren't very chatty in his office. It could be that simple: not that they were genuinely aloof or cold to their children, but that they were somewhat reserved, as they considered befitting people of their station in life.

(2) Given that the rate of autism is 1 in 100 American children, one would expect to find ASD children with all types of parents: popular jocks like Benedetta's husband, as well as shy types (or "geeks," if you will).

(3) I recall many years ago (I think it was around the time Doug Flutie's son was in the news for his autism diagnosis) someone remarking that autism was a "disease of rich people." I don't know the extent to which that was ever true, but if it was true at any point, it could have been because wealthier families are more likely to take their children to well-child visits and get all their shots. Now, it's possible that these parents studied hard in school, got good grades, and ended up at top tech or law firms--so they'd be perceived as "geeks" or "socially awkward," but their geekiness wouldn't necessarily have anything to do with their children's autism.

Having said all that, who knows? Maybe there is something to what Cia Parker says. My personal thought process about children's health and environmental exposures is finding out what we really know about the risk profile of any product, thinking hard about the purported benefit of the product, and then making a conservative decision--so it doesn't matter what my own genetic profile is, if I don't roll the dice over and over for my kid.

And I think that the idea of a genetic susceptibility may be overdone. I think it's more likely that we all have different thresholds for harm, and with the vaccine schedule expanding as it has been, a greater percentage of people's thresholds will be crossed every few years. Some people get ASDs; some people get allergies; some people get other health impairments. It's time for parents to question the benefits of the products that Big Pharma and Big Chemical are selling; it'll be a great day when no one's "toxic tipping point" matters, because no one gets anywhere near it.

Benedetta:

I am sorry that you took offense at what I wrote, but I think your hostility toward me was not merited. I was trying to say it's important to look for patterns in this epidemic.

It's obvious it's not genetic in the sense that an autistic parent just has an autistic child who inherits that hypothetical gene. Dr. Kanner, the respected neurologist who coined the term autism in 1943, said that it was a condition that had never been seen before or described by anyone. He and his colleagues at Johns Hopkins had published a compendium of every neurological disease known to man a few years before, and autism wasn't in it. 1943 was a few years after the pertussis vaccine had come into widespread use, and that is the obvious beginning of autism. There was no autism in Japan until 1949, two years after the first pertussis vaccines were given there by the Americans.

Every semester when I look at my university students, I think how friendly, polite, and healthy they appear. Nearly all of them have had all the vaccines. So the question is, why do some people react obviously to vaccines and not others?

My nephew placed first in the state on several state-wide standardized math exams when he was fifteen, and was invited to a conference of mathematicians. The hotel where the conference was held was sponsoring a conference of salespeople from a corporation at the same time. My brother took my Asperger's nephew, and said he was amused by the salespeople in the hall greeting each other effusively, launching immediately into loud hearty conversations. The mathematicians, on the other hand, he said were just like my nephew, quiet, awkward, and what a typical might describe as "dorky." Why would there be such an obvious difference if there were not a genetic trait involved? A friend who is a mathematics professor told me when my daughter was diagnosed with autism that he had three friends from his department who had autistic children: one had two of them. I think statistically that's higher than would usually be expected. I don't think anyone would ostracize those who have a talent for mathematics because they might have a gene that favors dangerous reactions to vaccines. And I don't think anyone would want to bank on their child not having inherited whatever gene or genes might be responsible, so they can give them 36 vaccines with impunity. The thirty-sixth vaccine placed on top of the stack of thirty-five might very well be the one that topples the whole stack.

Bettelheim's "refrigerator mom" theory, while politically incorrect, is correct in the sense that many moms who were on the spectrum themselves and in many cases not very demonstrative because of their own brain damage from vaccines, had children who had the same genetic sensitivity to vaccines, and reacted as might have been predicted, by developing autism.

If a child gets no vaccines, it's still apparently possible that they get the toxins in their mothers' systems while in utero, and later develop autism. I've read about moms who get the Rhogam vaccine having a child with autism. And, of course, children close to coal-burning electrical plants and presumably other toxins as well can develop autism even without getting any vaccines.

I have Asperger's myself, and cannot hold my own against sarcastic discourse. But my ideas on what I believe is the genetic link in autism are plausible and sincere. J.B. Handley said there was something in his genes that didn't get along with vaccines, so he would not be letting his children get any more. I don't think the idea should be scoffed at when it has a lot of supporting evidence.

Well, being over 40, I know darn well what the kids were like in my childhood as compared to now. Therefore, I don't need to depend upon anyone's claims. There was not one student in my school (which did not use corporal punishment or any other harsh means to control kids), who went to the office other than maybe one student a year per class for maybe throwing spit balls or whispering. Today, the kids throw books, can't sit in their seats, speak loudly out of turn, etc. They are way less able to focus. Labelled or not, the kids back then just weren't hyper. They learned social skills by observation. Today, many of the kids have to be told things over and over to learn social skills. Times are different. I can't believe those good ol days are gone. We better appreciate what we have today, because the future doesn't look good either.

Brilliant analogy and analysis! Although it was Bruno Bettleheim that proposed and perpetuated the "refrigerator mother" theory that damaged so many for so long. I don't think we can blame Kanner for that one (at least I've never heard anyone attribute that theory to Kanner). My daughter was born in 1983 and I was very actively involved with advocacy organizations during the '90's, when the increased incidence became apparent. The professional community just patted themselves on their collective backs for being such enlightended diagnosticians while those of us in the trenches trying to connect families with practical help KNEW that they were ignoring the proverbial elephant in the room. The turf wars and professional politics continue to leave us all without answers, even after spending untold millions. Thanks God for the Bernie Rimlands, William Crooks and Andrew Wakefileds of the world who will not abandon their controversial opinions to satisfy political correctness! How fast could research proceed if the barriers to innovative theories were removed?

"We need people in charge who have their heads set squarely on their shoulders."

It's not their heads, it's their money & careers. The corrupt Medical-Pharma-Gov't collusion rewards those who stick to the script, & punishes those who don't.

The honest ones keep silent because they know what will happen to them. Dr Wakefield was made a public example.

I think in most cases of autism there is a genetic susceptibility to react to vaccines. My grandfather was a quiet man who taught high-school mathematics and was the principal of the school. My mother was quiet and socially aloof, but she functioned well as a wife and mother, although she had no friends. My brother and I both reacted to the DTP given to us as infants with inconsolable screaming and head-banging on the crib, and we both have Asperger's syndrome, we're both brilliant intellectually but very awkward socially. His oldest son has Asperger's, brilliant intellectually, but is much more impaired than we were. My daughter reacted to the hepatitis-B vaccine her first day of life (which I had said I didn't want her to get), got vaccine-induced encephalitis when she was four days old, screamed constantly four days and nights, and was later diagnosed with autism. She is significantly impaired, and will probably never be able to marry or live independently. I think all of us would have been severely autistic if we had gotten all of the vaccines now routinely recommended, but we would only have been considered quiet and bookish if we had not gotten any vaccines. I think the siblings of an autistic child being more apt to get autism themselves means that they also have the genes that predispose them to react to vaccines. But if they didn't get the vaccines, they would not develop autism.

Amen Mr. Roberts - excellent article.