The move to replace ‘mental retardation’ with ‘intellectual disability’ is widely accepted, but little data exist on the impact of this change.

Since the DSM-5’s debut, schoolchildren have gained stronger legal rights and better opportunities for accessing services; for adults, it’s a different story.

A 2013 initiative to find biological roots for mental health diagnoses still has broad appeal, but has not produced a dramatic shift in autism research.

From a form of childhood schizophrenia to a spectrum of conditions, the characterization of autism in diagnostic manuals has a complicated history.

The strict definition of autism in the latest version of the diagnostic manual is antithetical to the idea that autism comes in a wide variety of forms.

Five years after its latest revision, the manual used to diagnose autism is back under scrutiny, as evidence suggests it excludes some people on the spectrum.

About 1 in 59 children in the United States has autism, according to data released today by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

A diagnosis of social communication disorder only keeps people from a community and resources they desperately want and need.

A large dataset that catalogs the features of many brain conditions could transform the quest for biomarkers of autism.

A rating of high severity of autism from the DSM-5, the latest version of the “Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders,” tracks with low intelligence scores.