Savant Syndrome Research Paper

In the early 1900’s autism was a completely misunderstood concept and any child who was living with it was assumed to be living with “childhood schizophrenia” and developed much slower than children without autism. A four year study of Donald Triplett gave Dr. Kannar a better understanding of what autism was and what it caused certain people to do. The main question was, does it affect the child’s development? Living with autism can affect a child’s development due to the fact that they don’t have a long attention span, can cause them to have a repetitive behavior, along with trouble in social situations whether it be verbal or non verbal.

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Waltz (2002) stated, “Autistic spectrum disorders are a medical puzzle. Although the symptoms can be seen, they are hard to define medically or treat. (p.1)

These prodigies, who had reached professional status at a very young age had varying theories of causation ranging from nurture to nature. The results indicated they had elevated level of intelligence, working memory and attention to detail. Interestingly, however, their family pedigrees showed an over-representation of relatives with autism. This indicates a potential commonality between child prodigies and savants genetically leading to the conclusion that child prodigies possess a form of autism but suppress typical signs.

Have you ever wanted to know several languages, be able to learn everything easily, or even have an IQ of at least 200? Charlie Gordon, in the story “Flowers for Algernon,” was a man who had an IQ of 68, but he went through a surgery that made him smarter than his own teacher at a school for the mentally challenged, and his own doctors. Charlie’s IQ was tripled after the surgery once he began to practice different languages as well as the English language. Charlie soon reverted to his former self at the end of the story, and this tripled intelligence that he possessed once before was soon back to the IQ of 68 Charlie had it easier in life after the surgery.

Savants are individuals who have notable inventive or intellectual skills although they may possess severe mental or physical inability. Orlando Serrell is a 10-year-old boy who developed a mysterious skill to perform complicated mathematical calculations. Orlando was hit on the left side of his head while he was playing baseball with his friends. Ever since his accident, Orlando is just not able to perform the complex mathematical calculations, but he is also able to remind the weather, his location, and what he does each day. Therefore, researchers consider Orlando an acquired savant because of his extraordinary abilities. The Wisconsin psychiatrist Darold Treffert has recorded 330 from all over the world, and only 30 of them are acquired

In the article Autism Society, Studies shown that autism caused by having a surplus of synapses, connections between brain cells. The surplus slowdown in the normal pruning process that occurs during childhood and adolescence brain development. In many families, there are patterns of autism or related disabilities that have a genetic basis. Children who have autism may have inherited, although researchers don’t know the direct cause of autism, they’re still investigating many numbers of theories, including the links among heredity, genetics and medical problems.

Savant syndrome is characterized by seemingly innate ability that far surpasses normal human capacity manifested in a specialized skill such as rapid calculation, memorization, or musical ability though usually accompanied by mental disability. Kim Peek, credited as the inspiration for the movie Rain Man, was diagnosed with FG syndrome characterized by intellectual disability, hyperactivity, and low muscle tone. In addition to FG, Peek was born without a corpus callosum and secondary hemispherical connections. One of his most notable abilities was his exceptional declarative memory, with the ability to recall entire books in a single read through. It is thought that his abilities may be associated with his split hemispheres, allowing him to process immense amount of information in parallel. Daniel Tammet is a notable Asperger’s syndrome savant with remarkable numerical

The 1988 film, “Rain Man”, told a story of an autistic man with incredible savant abilities. He can instantly count hundreds of objects at once, has an astounding memory for baseball statistics, the telephone book, and the amazing ability to count cards in Las Vegas. The hit movie exposed millions of people to both autism, and the phenomena known as Savant syndrome. Savant syndrome is a rare condition in which the person demonstrates profound abilities that are not commonly possessed by most people. Raymond Babbit’s autism, extraordinary special abilities, and remarkable memory are what categorize him as the world’s most famous autistic savant.

In savants the encounters of impressive abilities are always linked to extraordinary memory. This one of a kind memory is very impressive, but only within a very narrow area. For example, a savant may be able to memories the dictionary, but ask that same person a simple math question, they would be puzzled to figure it out. "The skills often associated with savant syndrome are the ability to play the piano beautifully, meaning complex pieces one would need months to learn by ear alone", (Howe 955). Being able to give a day of the week from any past or future date, and solving complex math problems extremely fast are also common feats performed by savants. "Another interesting skill some savants' possess is the perfect appreciation of time without the knowledge of a clock."(Howe 956)

For my summer homework assignment I read Born on a Blue Day by Daniel Tammet. It is an autobiography describing Daniel’s life and experiences as an Autistic Savant. I have always been fascinated with Savant Syndrome. Savants have tremendous abilities but at the same time have trouble interacting and living everyday life. It has always been a mystery to me how a person can have such genius but also struggle with activities most humans do not even give a second thought.

Autism spectrum disorder affects many Americans and until the last 20 years was widely unknown. This disorder is characterized by a deficit in social communication and interaction (Mitchell, 2012). Autism spectrum disorder is also characterized in DSM-V by difficulties following the rules of conversation and understanding things that are not explicitly stated. The purpose of this paper is to see how savant syndrome is related to autism spectrum disorder in cognitive functioning. Savant syndrome is a condition where people with developmental disabilities have one area where they excel (Treffert, 2013). A famous example comes from the movie Rain Man, where Dustin Hoffman plays a man with autism spectrum disorder and savant

In this chapter, author talks about couple of people with savant syndrome and have extraordinary skills. People like Eddie who had multiple disabilities as well as blind. But he has spectacular musical ability. Also Brittany maier who was 16 and was blind from birth with limited verbal skills, but astonishing pianist and composer. Kodi Lee is who has exceptional vocal and piano skills. Wen Kuei who was blind but he has exceptional skills on musical. It is believe that cause of blindness occur often in musical savants. Blind savants suffer from septic optic dysplasis that cause optic nerve hypoplasia, pituitary abnormalities and the absence of the spectrum pelludium and corpus callosum.

Imagine you are peacefully Black Friday shopping in a crowded mall. All of the sudden you get savagely attacked by two men. This incident leaves you with a severe concussion and post traumatic stress disorder, not to mention it also leaves you without all the sweet deals you were going to get. Aside from all the bad consequences, this attack turns you into a mathematical genius. Although, this scenario might seem impossible, it happens. It's called Acquired savant syndrome. Yes, it seems amazing, but the chances of you becoming an Acquired Savant, or an “accidental genius”, are extremely rare.

Savant is a unique form of autism that has its own special skills, which set Savant apart from all other forms of autism. The most common