Although 70% of autistics suffer from an intellectual disability, some affected, as the film Rain Man showed years ago, not only retain their non-verbal intelligence, but sometimes this is above average , something that has always intrigued the experts.
Now, a group of researchers from the universities of Edinburgh (United Kingdom) and Queensland (Australia) have analyzed the DNA of 10,000 Scots while they have carried out tests to assess their cognitive abilities. Thus they have verified that healthy people with genetic peculiarities associated with autism obtained better scores in the tests . Another subsequent study carried out with 921 adolescents confirmed this link.
“It was already suspected that there is a relationship between autism and higher cognitive function, as evidenced by the so-called 'Silicon Valley syndrome' and many stories from movies and popular literature. This research suggests that the putative autism genes do confer a slight intellectual advantage on their bearer when they are not suffering from the disorder, ”explained Nick Martin of the Queensland Institute for Medical Research.
