Category: Technology

Fitness trackers are great, but their applications could go far beyond simply tracking how many steps you take. For example, they could be used to seriously help people who need it — like children with autism. That’s the idea behind a new health tracker from a company called Awake Labs, which has just launched an Indiegogo campaign for the Reveal — a fitness tracker that’s aimed squarely at helping kids on the autism spectrum. So how does the Reveal help these kids? Reveal essentially measures the wearer’s body’s response to anxiety, helping understand…

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“THERE HAVE BEEN NUMEROUS ATTEMPTS BEFORE. WE FINALLY OVERCAME THE PROBLEM.” A computer algorithm called a “classifier” can distinguish between adults with and without autism by studying brain scans. The software found 16 key connections that allowed it to tell, with high accuracy, who had been traditionally diagnosed with autism and who had not. The team developed the classifier with 181 adult volunteers at three sites in Japan and then applied it in a group of 88 American adults at seven sites. All the study volunteers with autism diagnoses had…

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Apple has released a couple of videos over the weekend starring Dillan Barmache, a 16-year-old kid who is autistic and non-verbal. These two films are powerful and also make a strong point in favor of accessibility features, specialized apps for autistic people and more. Autism affects social and communication behaviors. Autistic people have a hard time communicating with the world. But it doesn’t mean they don’t have things to say. It’s easy to shut yourself away when you have this disorder because you have a hard time talking with people around…

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