Thread by @Richard_Autism

I am going to say this, I am confident that anyone saying that original PDA DISCO questions viewed PDA social manipulative behaviours as being "Strategic"/ not "manipulative" are either mistaken or lying.

The reasons for this, is that literature before O'Nions et al (2016), the LWC PDA DISCO paper viewed social demand avoidance to be manipulative. Also that two tools derived from original PDA DISCO questions view such behaviours as manipulative.

Definition of manipulation:
"to control or play upon by artful, unfair, or insidious means especially to one's own advantage"
&
"to change by artful or unfair means so as to serve one's purpose"
merriam-webster.com/dictionary/man…

https://twitter.com/Richard_Autism/status/1342827373805371393

Example Q11 "Good at getting round others and making them do as s/he wants" from EDA-Q. The EDA-Q is partly based off Original PDA DISCO items.
acamh.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.111…

Example
"Would you describe A as good at getting round others and making them do as s/he wants, or playing people off against each other?"
pdaresource.com/files/PDA_Ques…

Above sub-question is from a semi-structured interview by O'Nions & Happe, again partly based off original PDA DISCO questions.
pdaresource.com/files/An%20exa…

Wording for some of the original PDA DISCO questions is available. Q14 "Socially shocking behaviour with deliberate
intent (2) and (3)", not with intent part, which denotes manipulation.
link.springer.com/article/10.100…

This is O'Nions talking about manipulation in PDA, this article is derived from her thesis:
pdaresource.com/files/An%20exa…

Note O'Nions & others noting social insight and ability to push others buttons here. Not sure, why they are assuming PDA is autism here though.
acamh.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.111…

Lorna Wing in 2002, notes how persons with PDA often seem to gain reward from upsetting others (page 30).

Christie et al (2012) notes that persons with PDA have an ability to "distract, trick or divert" p184, again denotes social demand avoidance behaviours are manipulative.

Christie et al (2012, p20), notes that "manipulative" descriptor was deliberately chosen to note Persons with PDA have sufficient empathy to avoid demands & that it seems to be their greatest skill.

Also noted on page 13 that the empathy aspect of PDA is a strong feature countering an autism diagnosis. The other feature mentioned, was their ability for imaginative play.

There are other reasons in the literature to suggest that original PDA DISCO items viewed social demand avoidance, but this should be enough to show to people that there is a good case for this outlook.

What concerns me in the change of wording between original & revised PDA DISCO items, are that it appears the change was done to make PDA more more autism like.

We know that O'Nions et al (2016) are aware that socially manipulative demand avoidance makes it problematic fitting PDA into autism. O'Nions mentions it here. Christie mentions it Christie et al (2012).

Link to above research
pdaresource.com/files/An%20exa…

That Gillberg mention it here:
"However, the apparently socially manipulative behaviour is not characteristic of ASD, and is, in fact, by some, considered to be an exclusionary criterion for a diagnosis of ASD." p980.
link.springer.com/article/10.100…

We also know that O'Nions and others were investigating PDA from their understanding of autism, which happens to mean manipulative demand avoidance does not conform to.

"It should be noted that, so far, we have approached this profile from the starting point of our expertise in ASD."
discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1493…

We also know there is an agenda to get PDA recognised as autism, this was presented at the 2011 PDA conferences by NAS. The agenda is presented in Christie et al 2012 & mentioned in this conference flier.
…emandavoidancecom.files.wordpress.com/2020/08/2011-n…

Crucially, we know that research that changed the wording of PDA DISCO questions, O'Nions et al (2016) were trying to make PDA a meaningful autism subgroup.
link.springer.com/article/10.100…

In the process O'Nions et al (2016) were trying to make PDA DISCO "The approach taken here to select items was aimed at exploring the possible differentiation of PDA and focusing on items that were most ubiquitous to the profile" p416

They acknowledge "Newson’s descriptions were not specifically focused on the characteristics that can delineate PDA from the rest of the autism spectrum and were not ‘weighted’ in terms of which items were considered to be most central in the profile" p416

I would point that the approach taken by O'Nions et al (2016) is the exact opposite of what Newson was trying to achieve in her own research. She said PDA is not autism and it would be a mistake to view it as such.
adc.bmj.com/content/archdi…

Newson et al removed persons who showed autistic features from their dataset. Said that non-autistic persons can transition into PDA.

Newson diagnosed PDA as a standalone entity & spent at least 15 years trying to show PDA is significantly different from the autism spectrum, autistic disorder & Aspergers (she has a different definition for PDD-NOS).

"“hanging together as an entity” is not enough if that entity is not significantly different from both autism and Asperger’s syndrome, either separately or apart," Newson et al, 2003, p599.

Newson was trying to show what PDA entails in all its glory, also recognised that not all features were required for a diagnosis, that a person can transition into PDA.
adc.bmj.com/content/archdi…

Remember Newson's view of Pervasive Developmental Disorders included non-autistic persons and that some non-autistic persons could transition into PDA.

So O'Nions et al (2016) have taken the exact opposite approach of Newson. Presumably they either do not care about Newson's views or do not understand them.

It does seem that O'Nions et al (2016) changed the wording of PDA DISCO items to conform to their understanding of autism, i.e. they made PDA "autism-like".

For example, changing this PDA DISCO question "Socially manipulative behaviour to avoid demands" to this "Apparently manipulative behaviour"

Changing associated trait to above question "strategies of avoidance are essentially socially manipulative" to "with strategies of avoidance that are essentially ‘socially manipulative’" Note the quotation marks in the latter.
link.springer.com/article/10.100…

I will note that O'Nions et al (2016) justification for these changes are not provided, regardless their opinion is not sufficient to warrant changing the clinical wording of this PDA feature.

This does appear to be an example of PDA lobby, (those of the PDA development group and O'Nions et al), changing PDA to conform to autism understandings, i.e. controlling the looping effects of PDA human kind.
tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.108…

This is important, because Newson viewed PDA as separate & independent from autism. Yet, O'Nions et al (2016), are changing PDA to be similar to autism and part of the autism spectrum.

It seems I was right about the autism industry controlling the looping effects of the autism human kind.

I will end this hear. @threadreaderapp Please unroll.