The apparent rise in autistic people in the last 40 years

Question

I’m curious as to the seeming rise of autistic humans in the last decades.

Is it that it was just not understood and therefore not diagnosed/reported?

Are there environmental or even societal factors that have corresponded to this increase in cases?

In: Biology

Answer 1

My uncle in-law who was born in the 60s is “not autistic” 🙄, but you wouldn’t know it from meeting him. They didn’t classify it back then.