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Corinne Purtill
Science and Medicine Reporter
Science and Medicine Reporter
Corinne Purtill is a health and science reporter for The Los Angeles Times. Prior to this role, she reported on behavior, aging, science, health, and technology for The New York Times, The New Yorker, Time Magazine, and elsewhere.
It’s true that the rate of autism diagnoses in the U.S. have been rising. But experts say that it’s most likely due to the expansion of autism diagnostic criteria since the 1980s.
The diagnostic definition of autism has greatly expanded to include a much broader range of human behaviors, and we look for it more often than we used to.