Tommy's Stages Of Development Case Study

Tommy is a 5-year-old healthy boy. As the only child his parents adore him. They started to realize that some things were a bit odd about Tommy as he started to show signs of emotional and communication difficulties growing up. As he grew, they noticed a difficulty in speech, playing social games, and prefers to play alone. According to the DSM-5, Tommy falls under neurodevelopmental disorders of having autism spectrum disorder (Module 1: Autism and the Diagnosis). He has a love for stacking cars in order by colours and size. He loves to play with them for hours on end organizing the cars. Tommy shows signs persistent deficit in communication with poor eye contact and understanding facial expressions when his parents are speaking directly
He has not learned how to express his feelings, which is why he does not how to respond to even the slightest gestures like smiling or even telling him to do something which can also be very difficult. The second criteria fits well for Tommy as he exhibits restrictive, repetitive patterns of behaviours (Module 1: Autism and the Diagnosis). He has a strong attachment to his toy cars, and will easily get distressed if any small changes are made to his routine. Tommy has a fixated interest with cars and will become preoccupied to a point he doesn’t eat on time or at all. Tommy’s symptoms are present in his early developmental period. His love for cars taught him a lot about cars from the models, to parts, design, and history of cars. His behaviours are always repetitive, and his peers at school do not like interacting or playing with Tommy for the reason that he doesn’t really speak to any of them and spends his time alone. Tommy does not understand certain cues or interprets it differently compared to the typically developed children. He needs assistance and a team of professionals to help him become interactive with his peers and parents