Girls and Autism: Educational, Family and Personal Perspectives by Barry Carpenter, Francesca Happé, Jo Egerton and Baroness Sheila Hollins
Girls and Autism is an important book that asks a vital question: where are all the autistic girls? Bringing the issue of autism and gender to the top of the news agenda, our hard-hitting campaign generated widespread media coverage on why hundreds of autistic girls were either going undiagnosed or being misdiagnosed.
Through publicising real-life accounts from teachers, families and autistic girls themselves, we helped give a community of ‘lost girls’ a voice, raising awareness of those who suffer silently with autism. This included a first person account from Hollyoaks actress Talia Grant published in The I, interviews on BBC Breakfast and BBC London, a guest post on Mumsnet, articles in Primary School Management, Teach Primary, SENCO, and reviews in journals including The Psychologist, Journal of Mental Health and PMLD Link.
The campaign sparked healthy debate in the education and healthcare sector, as well as emotional reactions from parents. Book sales were considerably high in the first month of sale and it was the fourth best-selling book in Primary Education on Amazon, as a result.