Brent
Administrator
Phillip Griffin wasn’t sure what the future held when he received his high school diploma five years ago. He wanted to work, but he knew the job search wouldn’t be easy. Griffin has Asperger’s syndrome, an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) that can make it very hard to connect and communicate with others.
The majority of adults with autism are unemployed or underemployed. According to a recent survey, only about half of young adults with an ASD had worked for pay outside the home during the first eight years after high school and just one in five had full-time jobs. The study found that salaries earned by autistic adults were lower than for people with other disabilities. The findings are especially troubling when you consider that some 50,000 individuals with an ASD turn 18 each year.
“Not being able to express themselves properly, difficulty reading body language, the inability to perceive things from the point of view of another person, that can all be surprisingly detrimental when you’re trying to do something as simple as getting through a job interview,” said Eric Samstad, MD, medical director of the Adult Autism and Developmental Disorders Center at Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center in Baltimore, Md.
Griffin, 23, eventually landed his first job, but the work and pay were a big disappointment. “I was a grown man and believed I could do more,” he said. Now, four years later, Griffin has a job well-suited to his personality and interest in computers: He is an associate at AutonomyWorks, a Chicago-based technology company that trains and employs people with autism. Griffin works on website maintenance, data entry, and software testing.
“Having Asperger’s, it was certain that once he could find a place that could appreciate his special skill set that he would be a dedicated worker,” said Griffin’s mother Marikay.
For Cynthia Kim, 45, just the thought of a job interview made getting work seem daunting. “I don’t think I would even get past the job interview for many of the jobs I’d like to do or would be good at,” said Kim, whose Asperger’s wasn’t diagnosed until she was in her early forties. “I don’t present well in those high-pressure situations where social skills are being evaluated.”
The solution for Kim was to start her own business. For 20 years, she’s been an independent publisher of sports-related books. “It pushes me to continue developing new skills, to solve problems, to think outside the box,” said Kim, who has written a book about adult autism. “Most of what I know about running a business is self-taught, and it's very fulfilling to look at what I've created and feel like it's an expression of me and my unique way of doing things.”
Being self-employed has its challenges. “I have a lot of intricate systems that I use to keep myself on track to make sure I’m meeting goals,” she said. “There’s no one there saying, ‘Did you do this or that?’ You have to create your own system of checks and balances.”
Kim sees “a big gap” in services to help people “who are like me, who have a job, who have a family, but would benefit from some very pinpointed needs like job coaching and help with navigating social situations on the job.”
Now researchers at Northwestern University think they have found a way to help adults with autism be more effective at job seeking.
In a small study, adults with an ASD interacted with a computer-simulated interviewer named “Molly Porter.” Using software originally designed to hone FBI agents’ interrogation skills, Molly was programmed to ask participants a series of questions and then react according to the appropriateness of their responses.
“The virtual reality training helps by allowing the trainees to repeatedly practice answering the interview questions out loud,” said lead researcher Matthew Smith. “They are able to learn what responses are more helpful to establishing a rapport with Molly and which ones could be damaging.”
Dr. Samstad thinks the research is promising. “If you can train people in a virtual reality setting where it’s safe and can help them with their emotional reactions and then let them ease into a realistic setting, I think that’s very exciting,” he said.
Improving autistic adults’ chances of finding employment can be a win-win for prospective hires as well as employers.
“We now know that people on the spectrum have incredible skills that in some cases nobody else does,” said Leslie Long, director of adult services at autism advocacy group Autism Speaks, which offers job-related resources and networking groups. Long points to “their abilities as visual thinkers, close attention to detail, and not socializing but paying attention to their job.”
Griffin’s mom is thankful her son found work that gives him more independence and helps him learn valuable life lessons. “It’s his new identity,” Marikay said. “He’s a working guy, and a working guy has to master some life skills like what to wear, what to eat, how to get to work… built-in life skills that he picked up once he was working steadily.”
Source: 'A Working Guy' With Autism - Everyday Health
The majority of adults with autism are unemployed or underemployed. According to a recent survey, only about half of young adults with an ASD had worked for pay outside the home during the first eight years after high school and just one in five had full-time jobs. The study found that salaries earned by autistic adults were lower than for people with other disabilities. The findings are especially troubling when you consider that some 50,000 individuals with an ASD turn 18 each year.
“Not being able to express themselves properly, difficulty reading body language, the inability to perceive things from the point of view of another person, that can all be surprisingly detrimental when you’re trying to do something as simple as getting through a job interview,” said Eric Samstad, MD, medical director of the Adult Autism and Developmental Disorders Center at Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center in Baltimore, Md.
Griffin, 23, eventually landed his first job, but the work and pay were a big disappointment. “I was a grown man and believed I could do more,” he said. Now, four years later, Griffin has a job well-suited to his personality and interest in computers: He is an associate at AutonomyWorks, a Chicago-based technology company that trains and employs people with autism. Griffin works on website maintenance, data entry, and software testing.
“Having Asperger’s, it was certain that once he could find a place that could appreciate his special skill set that he would be a dedicated worker,” said Griffin’s mother Marikay.
For Cynthia Kim, 45, just the thought of a job interview made getting work seem daunting. “I don’t think I would even get past the job interview for many of the jobs I’d like to do or would be good at,” said Kim, whose Asperger’s wasn’t diagnosed until she was in her early forties. “I don’t present well in those high-pressure situations where social skills are being evaluated.”
The solution for Kim was to start her own business. For 20 years, she’s been an independent publisher of sports-related books. “It pushes me to continue developing new skills, to solve problems, to think outside the box,” said Kim, who has written a book about adult autism. “Most of what I know about running a business is self-taught, and it's very fulfilling to look at what I've created and feel like it's an expression of me and my unique way of doing things.”
Being self-employed has its challenges. “I have a lot of intricate systems that I use to keep myself on track to make sure I’m meeting goals,” she said. “There’s no one there saying, ‘Did you do this or that?’ You have to create your own system of checks and balances.”
Kim sees “a big gap” in services to help people “who are like me, who have a job, who have a family, but would benefit from some very pinpointed needs like job coaching and help with navigating social situations on the job.”
Now researchers at Northwestern University think they have found a way to help adults with autism be more effective at job seeking.
In a small study, adults with an ASD interacted with a computer-simulated interviewer named “Molly Porter.” Using software originally designed to hone FBI agents’ interrogation skills, Molly was programmed to ask participants a series of questions and then react according to the appropriateness of their responses.
“The virtual reality training helps by allowing the trainees to repeatedly practice answering the interview questions out loud,” said lead researcher Matthew Smith. “They are able to learn what responses are more helpful to establishing a rapport with Molly and which ones could be damaging.”
Dr. Samstad thinks the research is promising. “If you can train people in a virtual reality setting where it’s safe and can help them with their emotional reactions and then let them ease into a realistic setting, I think that’s very exciting,” he said.
Improving autistic adults’ chances of finding employment can be a win-win for prospective hires as well as employers.
“We now know that people on the spectrum have incredible skills that in some cases nobody else does,” said Leslie Long, director of adult services at autism advocacy group Autism Speaks, which offers job-related resources and networking groups. Long points to “their abilities as visual thinkers, close attention to detail, and not socializing but paying attention to their job.”
Griffin’s mom is thankful her son found work that gives him more independence and helps him learn valuable life lessons. “It’s his new identity,” Marikay said. “He’s a working guy, and a working guy has to master some life skills like what to wear, what to eat, how to get to work… built-in life skills that he picked up once he was working steadily.”
Source: 'A Working Guy' With Autism - Everyday Health
... accepting the fact that having in place a standard procedure that must be followed, simply for the sake of having one, is often not a good idea because it stifles initiative and creativity?
