Aggression is the number one area of concern for the parents of the ASD children and teens I see in therapy. It really is 
understandable why this problem would be more common for ASD youth once you think about it. One reason is that ASD children may have difficulty with empathy and perspective taking skills. It is harder for them to intuitively understand and to predict what is going on in other people’s minds. This type of problem has been called “mindblindness.” This can lead to ASD children and teens feeling confused and stressed about what is going on when interacting with others. If what others do seems unpredictable and capricious, it makes it easy to see why anger might be the resulting emotion.
Also, people with ASDs have more difficulty seeing “the big picture.” Their natural ability tends to be seeing the details with extraordinary clarity. It is more of a challenge for them to see how the details work together to create an abstract whole that is more than the sum of its parts. If you think of how often we use abstract, big picture language to explain things, you might have greater understanding about why someone on the spectrum erupts with a lack of comprehension and with frustration.
Another reason that children on the spectrum are prone to anger, meltdowns and aggression is that the world can just be so overstimulating for them. Too many people, too many complex social situations that they are not reading accurately, too much sensory overload (light, colors, smells, tastes, sounds). All this can contribute to the “neurological storm” of a meltdown or an act of aggression. I remember really getting a feel for this in one of my favorite books about someone on the spectrum, which I recommend: “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time” by Mark Haddon.
Additionally, and very sadly, so many ASD youth have been victimized and bullied by others. They have often been emotionally and/or physically harmed by their peers, leading to more confusion, sadness, loneliness, anxiety and mistrust. They may have found that aggression works to back off others who are being threatening and to keep themselves safe, which leads to a change obstacle (as in the child will be less likely to change the behavior if it works for them).
The obsessive thinking that characterizes ASDs is another factor that makes it hard for an ASD youth to “move on.” He may get an obsessive thought stuck in his mind, and the same angry thought goes round and round, generating the same angry feeling over and over. Thus you may have an ASD youth “ranting” about the incident that triggered his anger, and this can be another factor contributing to aggression.
Then, oh yes, what about the ultimate challenge – a nonverbal child who is unable make her needs understood to others in a clear manner (which is normally how we use language!). This child will have all the factors mentioned above for other ASD youth but then has this additional confound. It would be as if one of us was dropped into another alien world where not only did we not know their language and they didn’t know ours, but also there was some special complication that made it so we might never fully understand this new language that was being spoken around us, certainly not well enough to communicate our needs. Therefore we couldn’t let the aliens know the times when we were tired, or hungry, confused or homesick, or that we did not intend them harm. We also wouldn’t be able to understand their needs or intentions, so that we couldn’t tell if they were trying to help us or harm us. It isn’t hard to imagine becoming aggressive under these circumstances.
Along with all these factors that can be just part of being on the autism spectrum, you have the fact that ASD children and teens also have a higher likelihood of having other differences or disorders that can end up contributing to aggression. Some of these are anxiety disorders, ADHD, and mood disorders (such as depression and Bipolar Disorder) just to name a few.
The reason for today’s post is to help develop understanding and acceptance of why aggression may be a bigger problem for someone on the spectrum then for a typically developing peer. This does NOT mean that we should just accept it or give in to it at those times when it is coercive. However, when we better understand, we are less likely to react in anger ourselves, which generally only makes things worse. In the face of anger and aggression from a child, adults need to try to stay calm, and make smart choices about how to help the child in question settle back down to baseline. It’s easier to do that if we understand how hard the world can be so terribly difficult for the child or teen at that moment. I’ll be making more posts in the future about what to do to reduce aggression, but in the meantime you might want to read some of my other posts under the category of “preventing meltdowns” or visit my YouTube channel for other ideas on preventing meltdowns/tantrums. Our main goal is to figure out what is triggering this behavior so we can reduce or prevent acts of aggression in the future.
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Your article on anger and aggression really spoke to my situation. Both of those have been at the top of my child’s challenges for years. After being in a residential program two years now, my husband and I are not seeing a lot of progress in his ability to control himself (placed there because public school couldn’t handle his behaviors). Our child was born with Down’s and is on the ASD. His program consists of isolation and/or restriction when he gets mad or begins to get aggressive. I understand the safety issue, but I believe my son is smart enough to know that he can get out of something he wants by bad behaviors. Staff doesn’t seem to know how to replace good behaviors with bad. Any ideas?
Behavior always has some meaning/purpose. Often with aggression it is to avoid a demand, to gain attention or to gain access to something that is desired. It seems likely that if he spent 2 years in residential treatment that this would have already been looked at – but basically the function/purpose of the behavior needs to be analyzed and then the triggers/antecedents need to be worked on. Strategies might include reducing demands or changing them until there is compliance/no aggression and then gradually increasing demands again in a workable manner; or making sure to create positive attention getting strategies; or setting up a program that would allow him to gain access to desired items with appropriate behaviors — these are working on the antecedents/triggers using positive behavioral supports as an alternative to using consequences for negative behaviors. In addition, everyone working with him needs to make sure they NEVER give in to the bad behaviors, because even rare occasions of giving in would set up an intermittent reinforcement schedule, which is the most powerful reinforcement schedule there is and therefore would maintain the behavior.
I agree, please continue to post on this subject. This is my biggest concern and I too ache when I see my child turn into someone I don’t recognize. You want the best for your children and because of my daughter’s behavior, she has no friends, the teacher’s avoid her and I am constantly having to leave work to pick her up. They all look at me as though I’m a bad parent, nobody seems to understand. My daughter is ADHD as well, and suffers from anxiety – she’s only 7 years old. It’s hard to understand things in the way that she does, sometimes I get upset that she just doesn’t seem to “get it” and I’m at a loss of what to do or say. She is considered highly functioning, possible even gifted as she scored very high on the IQ test given by her school (score = 120) and they said her verbal skills are unlike anyone they’ve ever tested. I always assumed this was because she only wants to be around adults. Anyway, I would like to hear more on this topic especially. Thank you.
Thanks for sharing your concerns Beth. If she is struggling a lot with aggression at school, I hope they are doing some behavioral assessments to see what her triggers are, so they can set up plans to help prevent the aggression. Preventing children from getting to point where they are aggressive is the best solution.
Please keep talking about this. My son Jonah’s agression has broken his ability to attend his special school, it has broken my marriage, and it is breaking me. Please help us. I hate that we have to give him drugs now to mitigate the awful, violent episodes – that we have to place him in a residential educational setting and hour and a half away. Barbara, sometimes I don’t think I can take it anymore, seeing him this way. I want to love it out of him. When I cannot, I feel like I have failed on the most monumental scale there is. Thank you for speaking about this so I at least I feel like I am neither crazy nor alone.
You are neither crazy or alone. It is NOT YOUR FAULT! It not Jonah’s fault either. But you are right that love alone doesn’t fix it, even when that is what we have to offer – so then we have to pull in others (such as treatment) to have enough trained people to set up a good behavioral program that will help. This does not make you a bad mom – in fact, just the opposite. What a great parent to access these resources for your son!