Autism and migration...

A very interesting piece of research has suggested that the risk of a child developing autism if the mother has immigrated into the UK.

This was one of those studies that I initially was quite sceptical about - but toward the end of the report, they say the following...

"One theory is that the stress of migrating could act as a "trigger" for the disability, a factor discovered in similar studies looking at the causes of schizophrenia."

This is a really interesting idea, and it could explain the relationship that the researchers report. Going even further than they do - stress is associated with hormonal fluctuations, and there is research showing that there is a higher risk of autism if the child is exposed to higher levels of testosterone prenatally.

So, the news article reports the relationship between autism and migration as a relatively direct one. However, there may actually be four, or even more, stages...

Migration > Higer levels of stress > Changes in hormonal levels > Increased risk of autism.

A lovely example of the "correlation does not imply causation" mantra!!!