Robyn Young

Professor

Robyn Young's interest in autism began while studying savants as part of her PhD in Savant Syndrome in 1992. This work became the subject of an ABC documentary titled Uncommon Genius. She went on to develop a screening tool for Autistic Disorder suitable for use in children as young as 12 months of age. This tool, known as the Autism Detection in Early Childhood (Young, 2007, 2022), clearly operationalises early behaviours indicative of Autism Spectrum Disorder (autism). Together with colleagues at Flinders University she has developed an intervention program for autistic children called SPECTRA (Young, Partington & Goren, 2009). Her continued work in the forensic arena and the interaction between autistic people in the criminal judicial system led to the book Crime and autism spectrum disorder: Myths and mechanisms (Brewer & Young, 2015). This book systematically reviews the literature related to autism and crime as well as introducing some of her own case studies. She has also published a book on preparing autistic children for school Ready, Set, Learn. (Moffat & Young, 2017).

Professor Young has prepared more than 60 reports for court where persons with autism have been involved either as victims or perpetrators of crime. She has appeared in court as an expert witness in South Australia on more than 15 occasions and twice in New South Wales. She works in private practice 2 days a month as an autism diagnostician. She is currently also an autism diagnostician trainer. She has appeared as a keynote speaker in numerous autism conferences throughout the world (USA, Mexico, Europe, Hong Kong, China) and has written more than 80 journal articles related to autism. Interest areas include autism and crime, autism and eating disorders, autism and trauma and autism and the female presentation. She currently serves on the Professional Advisory Board Of Autism SA and has recently been elected to the Australia Autism Advisory Board. Her expert opinion is often sought through the media. She is also currently Head of Discipline in the School of Psychology at Flinders University where she is involved in research, teaching and postgraduate supervision.