Peculiarities in the endocrine response to insulin stress in early infantile autism.

Autistic children subjected to the stress of insulin-induced hypoglycemia showed slower recovery of blood glucose, and faster and intractable cortisol response in the 3 hours following the stress. These data suggest that autistic children over-react to this stressor and support clinical evidence of stress intolerance. It is suggested that this peculiarity may be implicated in an explanation of the abnormal behavior seen in this disorder.