In summary, many different environmental components might be involved in the etiology of autism. These factors range from specific factors such as prenatal exposure to valproic acid, over advanced paternal age to general factors such as area of residence.
During an individual’s life exposure to a multitude of different factors occurs. To my knowledge most questionnaires trying to assess an environmental involvement of autism rather focus on one subset of environmental factors such as exposure to certain heavy metals. This specification on one factor might result in a loss of potential additional informations. Firstly, no specific cue causing autism is yet found and secondly rather a combination of several different factors, with each relatively low impacts, might lead to the onset of the disease. Therefore, I constructed a questionnaire, including as many factors with a scientific basis as feasible.