Talk:Rell/@comment-2602:306:CD2B:6610:B0A5:2918:66D3:BCD1-20170921162547/@comment-68.198.32.227-20171229114848

Koesykeoz: A person with an ASD has reduced neurons in the amygdala (responsible for social interactions and recognizing faces - this comes up in the quest with the flash cards) and the cerebellum (responsible for, among other things, organizing the information from the sense organs into something that the rest of the brain can process). We don't see Rell in any normal social interaction, so we can't tell much of this apart from the flash cards, and the bit where he talks about weird science concepts even though his mom can't understand them. We mostly see Rell's cerebellum symptoms:

Since the autistic person's cerebellum is reduced, the cerebellum is easily overwhelmed by sense data; this is why Rell is pained by most senses. Autistic people can "stim," it's different for each person but they find patterns in the world, and this soothes them (patterns are easier to process). This is why Rell's Donda gives him comfort; the spinning and the humming have a regularity. Each autistic person is different in their sensitivities; Rell seems particularly sensitive to touch and sound. You can see this in his mini-comic: when the girl grabs his arm, it looks like he's surprised, but he's probably in terrible pain. His comment in the comic "touching is too much noise" is insightful. At least for me, the pain is the same no matter what sense it comes from, and if we take "noise" to mean overwhelming sensation, it all makes sense.