Customer Reviews

Thinking in Pictures: And Other Reports from My Life with Autism

5 star:		(47)
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3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(2)
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This is a must-read book for parents, professionals, and teenagers/adults living with autism (it is not appropriate for younger readers). It is easy to read, entertaining and informative. Readers will come away with a greater understanding of autism and how widely the spectrum of autistic disorders can vary, as well as what to do to help someone with autism.

Ms. Grandin's greatest gift lies in her ability to understand both the worlds of non-autistics and autistics alike. Using her personal experiences as well as significant contributions from other people, she explains how baffling the world is to a person with autistism, in terms of unwritten social codes, our reliance on verbal thinking, relationships, appearances, etc. She discusses concrete ways in which autistics can be helped to integrate with society -- in families, friendships, other relationships, schools, and jobs.

Her chapter on medication is valuable, discussing how autism often requires different doses than are commonly prescribed. This is information that isn't readily available unless you are working with a physician who has extensive experience with autistic patients. Since an autistic person is highly sensitive, the effects of behavior modification medications are often amplified, requiring a lower dose. Particular attention needs to be given to medication combinations.

There is also information on many of the related disorders that often accompany autism, such as sensory integration disorders, Tourrette's Syndrome, ADD, etc. Everything is written from the perspective of the autistic with Ms. Grandin acting as translator.

Besides being informative, the book is optimistic in its view of autism. Ms. Grandin plainly credits autism for her success in her chosen profession. In fact, my only criticism of the book is the length of time she devotes to discussing her career path (this information is also contained in her earlier book "Emergence" ). However, this information may be motivating to autistics reading the book as she certainly has achieved remarkable things. She also includes a chapter on other highly accomplished autistics, with the message that different neurological wiring can be a great asset if properly supported early in life.

It is an informative, inspirational book that opens a window on autism and lets the rest of the world look in and understand.

This is the book that, from its first sentence, opened the door for me to understanding my son's world. I read it three years ago and still remember having to put the book down every paragraph or two, clutch my forehead, and say "Oh, my God, that's what's going on." It describes more clearly and convincingly than any other source the sensory experience of autism, and provides a much-needed view of the positive side of the condition. It's also very easy to read. The only caveat I could offer is that treatments have advanced so much since this book was published that its information is out of date. Otherwise, absolutely indispensable.

After reading a number of "What is autism?" books, I still cannot get any reassurance about how my autistic 4-year-old boy faces his future. But this book brings light and hope to me. The author's personal sharing & indepth explaination about what she faced before show me what my boy needs to conquer in his life.

I don't know much about the technical terms or scientific stuffs in autism, but I do know that I need to walk with my boy in his developmental path. This book gives me both emotional support and technical information about what I need to know.

My husband doesn't like those "what is autism?" books (maybe he doesn't like those who want to earn money in this topic) but he does read this one and even discuss with me in details about what our boy may be facing.

I highly recommend this book to the parents of autistic kids.

Temple Grandin's autobiographical work traces the entire span of her life in order to give a full and complete picture of an individual that has found her own way to cope with and overcome many of the obstacles presented by autism. She adopts a non-linear style, supplementing the story of her recent successes with recollections of her successes and failures along the way. Her discussion of autism is complemented by ample citation of scientific sources and of the accounts of many others who suffer with similar difficulties. She provides insight into many facets of autism: sensory, emotional, physical, psychological and spiritual. The metaphor that ties her story together is her work with livestock, as she draws abundant comparisons between animal psychology and the workings of the autistic mind. The pursuit of more humane and civilized livestock-handling facilities is her life's work, and she empathizes strongly with the way that these animals feel. I found Temple Grandin's account of her life to be incredibly interesting and inspirational. I read the entire book in one sitting. Her writing style is clear and fluid and it is amazing that someone suffering from autism has been able to gain such a mastery of the written word. I saw no major weaknesses in her writing style, and was impressed by the coherent and original chronology that she employs.
The story of her life resonated with me on several different levels. Having read about autism and having seen the movie Rain Man, I thought I had a fairly good understanding of autism. Grandin's narrative opened my eyes, giving me a glimpse of the way that the autistic mind works. I also found her life to be interesting because of her work with farm animals. I grew up on a dairy farm, and I could vividly picture each scene that she described. I had never really thought about animal psychology before, but now the behavior of our animals makes a lot more sense to me. Her identification with these animals also helped me to understand that autistic individuals think in a way that I will never be able to understand. Grandin thinks totally in visual images, cataloguing everything she has seen into a highly organized mental database. Her ability to visualize solutions and to retrieve information is astounding, and her analysis of the relationship between genius and autism was especially persuasive. Overall, I found this autobiographical narrative to be very compelling.

I find I usually loose interest in books that are not novels quickly. Temple's writing and life experiences shared in this book are so interesting I couldn't put it down. I purchased this book when I was told my fiancé's son may have autism I started reading everything I could on the subject. Much of it was hard to read, and gave me the impression that her son would be living in hell due to his condition. This book does not paint the picture of autism as something that is to be looked forward to, but it doesn't scare you as much either. Beyond giving you a picture into the life of an autistic person, this book is very informative on the condition and ways to deal with it. I feel it is a must read for anyone who has a person with autism in their life. I also feel that it is a great book for anyone to read, as it is fascinating to understand the way Temple thinks.

This is mostly good, well rounded book. However, Dr. Grandin does make some glaring over generalizations, and often seems to assume all autistic people are like herself. While she admits this is not true in place, she will go to the very next paragraph and say something like, "because all autistic people are visual...," when, in fact, some autistic people have severe visual processing difficulties and are not visual at all. While I can relate to most of what she says as an autistic person, I know many who cannot. This kind of misinformaton, combined with her often playing the role of *THE* high0fuctiong adult (who understand all autistic people) is potentially harmful.

Learning about Temple Grandin has validated my own life and gifts, and has put the symptoms of my disability (Asperger's Syndrome) into perspective. Many reviewers say that those *working with* autistics would enjoy her book, but just as importantly, other autistic-spectrum people will find some helpful and relevant information in her book that they can use to apply to their own life.

Temple's second book, Thinking In Pictures encorporates a lot of her first book Emergence but goes into the workings of an Engineers mind which is clearly incredibly able to 'think in pictures'. I'm certain fellow engineers, many architechts and designers will be able to relate to this process, not just people who, like Temple, are diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome.

In educational literature different processing styles are discussed; the visual learner who thinks in pictures and learns from visuals, the auditory learner who thinks in words and learns from hearing, the kinaesthetic learner who is neither visual nor auditory and learns through physically doing, touching and handling form. Most people have all of these forms of learning whilst others, even in the non-autistic population, are far more proficient or deficient in one than the other.

Whilst many other authors with autism spectrum conditions have written about difficulty processing auditory information, and whilst many verify that, like Temple, they are visual thinkers, this is not unique to those on the autistic spectrum and there will be many non-autistic people in fields such as design, science, IT and mathematics where strong visualisation skills make them so good at their jobs, who will be able to relate to her thought processes.

Similarly, whilst there is certainly an abundance of people with Asperger's Syndrome in these job areas (Temple herself is an engineer) and many people at the Autistic end who do well in computer and maths skills and cope well with visual prompts and techniques like the Picture Exchange Communication System (PECS)it is also true that many others struggle to use PECS at all and lack demonstrated interest or skills in the same areas. Yet it would do these same people a diservice merely to see them as lower functioning but still visual thinkers like Temple.

Visual thinking is not the only non-verbal form of thought. Those whose dominent learning system is that of a kinaethetic style may actually be so good at learning through hands on activities or physical patterning precisely because they are otherwise so impaired and poor at visual learning.

A considerable percentage of people at the autistic end of the spectrum are far more physical and kinaesthetic than intellectual, as is the privilege of visual thinkers. Many at the more 'low functioning' end of the spectrum display such severe visual recognition and visual perceptual challenges it would be difficult to imagine how some of these people are able to build up the visual thinking skills Temple describes. Yet if we assume, as Temple invites us to, that all autistics think as she does, then we might rely on techniques designed for visual learners and let our kinaesthetic learners down, mistakenly assuming them to intellectually disabled when in fact they may be no more so than any deaf-blind child. Many kinaethetic learners have untapped talent in areas involving movement; climbing, trampolining, skating, balancing, gymnastics, stacking, building, moulding. Yet in a world where the auditory is the norm and the visual is championed, their skills are undervalued and underextended.

Temple's book is a wonderful outline of visual thinking and will certainly benefit understanding of those who rely on this processing style rather than auditory learning. But its important not to over-extend the usefulness of this book to a group who may benefit from something quite different and who may be the least likely on the autistic spectrum to ever learn language because language is learned not just auditorily but in the links between the auditory and the visual.

I have no connection with autism. This book was recommended to me because I cannot think in pictures; my mind works with ideas and words. Temple Grandin has written a book about a way of thinking that is so alien to me she might as well be from a different planet. Absolutely amazing. I did not know that the world could be seen from this perspective. This book has changed the way I try to see the world. No TV program or lecture will cause you to shake your head in bewilderment like this book.

Temple Grandin is the Helen Keller of the 21st Century. Only her words can describe the world she lives in. Or maybe pictures.

Grandin gives everyone a looooong overdue report of what Autism is like from the autistic point of view and hopefully will blow the old stereotypes out of the water. Most people either think of autistics as either severely retarded or overly smart but helpless, like the Dustin Hoffman's character in "Rain Main." The truth is that there are many autistics out there, some undiagnosed, who function in the real world. Every autistic "expert" should read this book along with parents and teachers of autistics. Highly recommend