I am majoring in speech language pathology and in the future, I would love to work with children and adults with autism as a speech therapist. My nephew has autism and it fascinates me to observe how his brain works, his behaviors, his speech, and his way of life. In order to understand how a brain of a person with autism operates, it would be best to focus in and study the neurotransmitters of that human. Neurotransmitters are chemical substances are released at the end of a nerve and sends an impulse which diffuses across the synapse which then causes the transfer of the impulses to other nerves. After doing research, I found that Glutamate is the main excitatory neurotransmitter in the brain and GABA (gamma-aminobutyric acid) is the main inhibitory neurotransmitter in the brain. Research states that an imbalance in synaptic excitation and inhibition is observed to be an addition onto the diseased physiology of autism spectrum disorder. As most know, people with autism have a tendency of being less communicative, have less eye contact, and they have a harder time expressing their emotions or feelings. Oxytocin is a hormone that is responsible for social bonding, sexual reproduction, childbirth, and the period after childbirth. The hormone usually has pro-social effects on a human. Research has shown that the neuropeptide oxytocin has been implicated to autism. This is a logical stance because social impairments are closely linked to autism spectrum disorder and they lack having social bonding and attachment during childhood and soon after (Neurotransmitters). It has also been found that there is a link between neurotransmitter imbalance and brain connectivity between the two regions of the brain. The imbalance and the lack to communication between the regions plays a role in social communication and language in people autism (Staff). Therefore, it is evident to see that there is a relation between the neurotransmitters and the brains of people with autism spectrum disorder and it is due to the imbalance of neurotransmitters and the communication loss among regions in the brain. I find this interesting because knowing that I will be working with children with autism in the future, it is helpful to know a little about what the neuroscience is behind why they behave and operate in the manner that they do.
Works Cited:
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- “Neurotransmitters: Spectrum: Autism Research News.” Spectrum, www.spectrumnews.org/wiki/neurotransmitters/.
- Staff, Science X. “Link Found between Neurotransmitter Imbalance, Brain Connectivity in Those with Autism.” Medical Xpress – Medical Research Advances and Health News, Medical Xpress, 6 June 2018, medicalxpress.com/news/2018-06-link-neurotransmitter-imbalance-brain-autism.html.