The connections in autistic brains are idiosyncratic and individualized

Each autistics' brain is distinct; non-autistics' brains are remarkably uniform.

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[angrydurf]

Mondoman[/url]":qv6e3rl4]I'm confused by the story's final paragraph. The author says:

An intriguing possibility is that, because neural connections are shaped by the routine behaviors and experiences that we have every day, people with ASD each exhibit idiosyncratic connectivity patterns in their brains because they each experience the world and interact with their environment in an idiosyncratic way.

The author seems to be assuming that neural connections are shaped ONLY by the routine behaviors (and not, for example, by gene products that affect neuronal "pathfinding"), and thus suggesting that ASD might be *caused* by idiosyncratic behaviors and experiences.
Given the range of behaviors of children, this seems farfetched -- is there any evidence for this?

Well that is why the study looks at regional interconnects rather than specific interconnects. Basically while there may be significant variations from individual to individual in the exact neural pathway that looks at a red wall and say it's red, almost all Neurotypical people will light up connections between the same regions of the brain when asked to name the color of a series of walls.

The individual connections are based on their unique experiences with learning colors, the overall trend is that identifying colors uses the same regions of the brain and requires interconnects between them. Thus looking at many Nerotypical adults reveals similar clustering of high and low connectivity. The thinking in the final paragraph is that if the ways in which ASD patients experiance and interact is unique to the individual it would explain unique pathing.

It is likely true but less likely to be due to an underlying physiological or biochemical cause of Autism than because Autism is diagnosed symptomatically. There are a wide range of behaviors that get lumped into Autism with varied effect on the individuals ability to function. It is highly unlikely that so broad a set of symptoms has a single underlying cause.