Exploration of autism using expert systems

Social and emotional ties are an important anchor in life and hence a lack of these is a major hurdle in achieving one's dreams and goals. Autism is a Social development disorder that is marked by a distinct lack of social and language skills. It is a disorder rather than an organic disease and hence is difficult to diagnose without a high index of suspicion. Prevalence rates for Autism, in various societies ranges from 1 in 10000 to 15 in 10000. Autism is a socially crippling disorder and can be a huge strain on families caring for these children. The Indian scenario with regard to Autism is still in its nascent stage. There is very limited resource and infrastructure available for these special children. Most Autistic children attend special care schools that provide for children with Cerebral Palsy or Downs Syndrome. Hence there arises a need for developing technological aids designed to help diagnosis and increase parent participation for Autistic children. This led to the development of a Knowledge based screener (KBS) and an intelligent trainer system that can detect all categories of the developmental disorders. Social developmental disorders comprise a wide spectrum. Pervasive developmental and similar disorders constitute this spectrum. This knowledge-based system we have developed will help to detect the presence of these disorders and provide home-based intervention. The main goal of our study is to develop technological aids, which will help Autistic individuals to be identified earlier and initiate early intervention for the management of autism.