Facebook – ASF Weekly Science Podcasts

Subscribe: RSS

Sometimes treatment targets come from the places you wouldn’t expect. This week, three new studies on the biological and sometimes, behavioral, effects of three commonly used compounds used to treat high cholesterol, edema, and angina were studied in people with autism. Instead of focusing on just the behavior however, these studies took the approach of examining them from the behavioral side, determining if there was a biological reason why these compounds should be helping people with autism. This means autism research has turned a corner – it’s not just about behavioral improvements, but about how the drug is working in the brain. Also, a fun study about social media in people with autism. They don’t just use it like the rest of us, it actually makes people with autism happy.

Here are the studies included in this week’s podcast:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29485900

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29484909

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29484149

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29483603

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

Individual research studies are great. But even better is when someone takes these studies and puts them together to see if one study shows the same thing another does, and if they do is the effect size consistent? Sometimes you can only do this by going old school and pooling the data from the individual studies. This is especially helpful in determining the effectiveness of different interventions. This week, Dr. Matthew Lerner and his colleagues at Stony Brook University published a meta analysis of group social skills interventions. They put together well-designed studies and asked: do they work? Are they better than getting nothing at all? To find out, listen to this week’s ASF podcast.