In The Politics of Autism, I discuss depictions of ASD in popular culture.
Rebecchi, K., & Nordahl-Hansen, A. (2026). Short Report: Autism in Popular Media: A Google Trends Analysis of Public Interest. Autism, 0(0). https://doi.org/10.1177/13623613261489305
Lay AbstractThis study looked at how people search online for information about autism and Asperger’s, and how popular movies and TV shows influence that interest. By analysing Google Trends data from 2004 to 2025, we found that searches for autism have steadily increased, while searches for Asperger have declined. A small number of media portrayals accounted for most of the search activity, showing that certain portrayals strongly shape public curiosity. Most of these characters were male, although interest in female autistic characters has grown in recent years. Overall, the findings suggest that popular media play an important role in how the public learns about and understands autism, influencing which terms, stories and representations become most visible online.
From the article:
A first notable result is the sex imbalance in the media products identified. Male characters clearly dominated the sample, whereas female characters remained comparatively underrepresented (ratio 1:3). This pattern is consistent with long-standing observations in both clinical and media research (Dean, Nordahl-Hansen, 2022); however, the present data also suggest a gradual change over roughly the last decade, with increased visibility of female-coded characters such as Julia in Sesame Street, Woo Young-woo in Extraordinary Attorney Woo and other more recent portrayals highlighted in research (Rebecchi, 2025; Tharian et al., 2019).
A second important finding concerns the disparity between canonical status in academic or clinical discourse and apparent visibility in public search behaviour. Rain Man, for example, is often treated as the iconic autism reference (Ikalyuk & Kuzmyn, 2015), yet in the present dataset, it was among the least recurrent and least popular items. Conversely, titles such as The Big Bang Theory, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time and Sesame Street generated far stronger cumulative search associations. This suggests that the classic reference points do not necessarily coincide with the media objects that structure contemporary online curiosity and interest.
Moreover, some characters frequently discussed in relation to autism (Nordahl-Hansen, 2017) or autistic traits (The Bridge, Community, Mozart and the Whale, Bones, Dr. House and Atypical) appeared rarely or not at all. Likewise, Music by Sia, despite intense public debate and criticism, in particular by autistic people (Orm et al., 2023), appeared only twice. Although documentaries differ generically from fictional portrayals, their inclusion reflects the broader aim of capturing the full range of popular media formats through which autism becomes visible in public search behaviour. Google Trends captures one specific mode of public engagement, and this likely underrepresents media discussions and visibility that unfold primarily on other platforms (TikTok, Reddit and IMDb, for instance). In addition, the analysis was limited to the terms autism and Asperger; the Google Trends interface does not support Boolean or wildcard queries, precluding the inclusion of related terms such as autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Future studies may consider extending the search to additional terminology.
The temporal contrast between autism and Asperger is also clear. Across both categories Movies and TV & Video, interest in autism increased progressively from 2004 to 2025, especially from the late 2010s onward, whereas interest in Asperger declined. This pattern likely reflects a broader terminological and cultural shift. Since Asperger’s syndrome was removed as a separate diagnostic category in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) in 2013 and folded into ASD, the term has gradually lost institutional centrality even if it has remained visible in public discourse. In addition, controversies surrounding Hans Asperger and renewed critical discussion of the historical and ethical implications of the label (see Rebecchi, 2024, for a discussion about this topic) may also have contributed to its declining use. However, the geographic differences between the two terms may suggest that the replacement of Asperger by autism has not occurred uniformly across linguistic and cultural contexts (both in research and popular media). The geographic distribution of search interest should nonetheless be interpreted with caution. While Asperger functions as a proper name and circulates across languages, the term autism is an English-language word; speakers of other languages are more likely to search for equivalent terms (e.g., autismo, autisme, Autismus). The apparent concentration of autism searches in English-speaking regions may, therefore, partly reflect linguistic factors, and cross-regional comparisons between the two terms should be read accordingly.
Finally, one particularly intriguing case is Tim Burton, which was excluded for not being a fictional character or media product in the strict sense. Searches involving Tim Burton may reflect public interest in reported statements or speculation concerning his own possible autism; however, they may also reflect attempts to interpret autism through his films or through universe and characters perceived as atypical or outsider figures in Burton’s cinematic universe (Edward Scissorhands, Sweeney Todd, Alice, Miss Peregrine’s Home).