SAVANT SYNDROME

1. SAVANT SYNDROME Gizem Şamdan 05.05.2014

2. Outline

3. SavantSyndrome ... is a remarkable condition in which peoplewith autism, mental handicaps or major mental illness, have exceptionalabilities in a specificarea in contrast to their overall disability. Savant: «wisehuman» in French At first: theterm ‘idiot-savant’by Down (1887)to describe intellectually impaired individuals withcontrasting outstanding abilities. More recently: the terms‘monosavant’ (Charness, Clifton, & MacDonald,1988) and ‘savant syndrome’ (Treffert, 1989) havecome into general usage.

4. SavantSyndromecont. • Rarecondition: - 1 in 1000in an institutionalizedpopulationwith a dignosis of mentalretardation. - But 1 in 10 autistic people showsome savant skills. • About 50% of peoplewith savant syndrome have autistic disorder and theother 50% have other forms of developmental disability,mental retardation or other CNS injury or disease • Males outnumber females in an approximate ratio of 6 to 1. • CongenitalorAcquired: - Savant syndrome can be congenital- frombirth-, or it can be acquiredfollowing brain injury or disease later in life

5. TwoTypes: • Talented Savants: themostcommontype - the individual displays a high level of ability that is in contrast to their disabilityandoverallfunctioning. - Theseabilitiesarecalled: «Splinter Skills» • Prodigious Savants:theraresttype - the ability or brilliance is not only spectacular in contrast to the disability, but would be spectacular even fora non-disabled person.

6. Savant SkillsThe abilities are usually in art, music, calendar calculation, mathematics or spatial skills. • Memorization - superior memory is a common feature of savant syndrome • Lightening calculation - instantaneous calculation of multiplications, square roots, etc. • Calendercalculating - the ability to identify the day of the week upon which a particular date falls

7. SavantSkills • Musical ability - great skill in playing instruments or singing; the piano is the most popular instrument. (Ex:the ability to play the piano without being taught.) • Artistic ability - exceptional painting, sculpture and especially drawing skills • Language ability - fairly rare -  the person may be unusually gifted in languages. • Mechanical or spatial skills: the capacityto measure distances precisely without benefit of instruments, the masteryof mapmaking and directionfinding.

8. SavantSkillscont. • The skills tend to be right hemisphere oriented: - These skills can be characterized as non-symbolic, artistic,concrete, and directly perceived, in contrast to lefthemisphere skills that are more sequential, logical, andsymbolic. • Generally a single special skill exists, but in some instancesseveral skills exist simultaneously. • Whatever the particular savant skill, it is always linked to massive memory. • Savant skills characteristically continue, rather thandisappear, and with continued use, the special abilitieseither persist at the same level or actually increase.

9. Theories • No single theory has emerged that canexplain all savants: • Biological-Developmental- genetic, neurochemical, left hemisphere dysfunction, frontal and temporal lobe damage • Cognitive - deficits in executive function and abstract thinkingmaycause highly developed procedural memory and photographic imagery(Happé, 1994; Schopler & Mesibov, 1995) • Deficitin theory of mind(Frith, 1989) • Modularityof mind- when executive cognitive functions are disrupted the mind exhibits a striking modular organization (Smith & Tsimpli, 1995)

10. Howdo they do it? • Increasinglyplausible explanationfor savant abilities in many cases is left brain injurywith right brain compensation.

11. Genes? • It is possible that a gene, or genes,in the chromosome 15q11-13 region may be responsibleforthesavantskills. • Nurmi and colleagues (2003) identified(among 94 families) 21 families as “savantskills positive” and 73 families as “savant skill negative.”

12. Kim Peek, the Real«Rain Man»a prodigious savant • the inspiration for the character played by Dustin Hoffman in the movie. • born with severe brain damage. • His childhood doctor told Kim's father to put him in an institution and forget about the boy. • Kim's father disregarded the doctor's advice. • Kim is severely disabled, has difficulty walking andcannotevenbutton his shirt. His IQ tests arewell below average. • His deficits result from corpus callosum disorder.

13. Nickname: "Kimputer" • What Kim can do is astounding: • He has read12,000 books and remembers everything about them. • Readstwo pages at once - his left eye reads the left page, and his right eye reads the right page. • It takes him about 3 seconds to read through two pages - and he canremember everything. • Kim can recall facts and trivia from 15 subject areas from history to geography to sports. • He also remembers every music he has ever heard • Tell him a date, and Kim can tell you what day of the week it is. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dhcQG_KItZM

14. References • BetterHealth Channel. (2014). AutismSpectrumDisorderandSavantSyndrome. Accessed April, 24, 2014. http://www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au/bhcv2/bhcarticles.nsf/pages/Autism_spectrum_disorder_and_savant_syndrome • FamiliesAffectedByAutism. (2013). Autistic Savants – Kim Peekhttp://www.familiesaffectedbyautism.co.uk/autistic-savants-kim-peek/Accessed May, 1, 2014. • Heaton, P., & Wallace, G. L. (2004). Annotation: the savant syndrome.Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 45(5), 899-911. • Hiles, D. (2002). SavantSyndrome. http://www.psy.dmu.ac.uk/drhiles/Savant%20Syndrome.htmAccessed April, 26, 2014. • Treffert, D. A. (2009). The savant syndrome: an extraordinary condition. A synopsis: past, present, future. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 364(1522), 1351-1357. • Wisconsin MedicalSociety. (2013). Savant Syndrome 2013— Myths and Realities. https://www.wisconsinmedicalsociety.org/professional/savant-syndrome/resources/articles/savant-syndrome-2013-myths-and-realities/Accessed April, 26, 2014.

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