Those studies were designed to confirm Professor Sir Simon Baron-Cohen's "extreme male brain" theory (which, by the way, is a crock of shit). High androgen levels
and high oestrogen levels are associated with autism (ref:
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41380-019-0454-9) and there's no reason to believe the arrow of causality points in any particular direction.
I recommend you not focus overmuch on why your kids are autistic. (The most likely reason is that one or both of the biological parents are autistic.) Disabilities are contextual, and autism can be a significant disability if you want to "live a normal life", so the best approach is not to impose arbitrary constraints and unrealistic expectations on them. (And really, who wants to keep up with the Joneses, anyway? https://xkcd.com/308/)
If you're interested in the topic generally, by all means learn about it, but none of this will help your daughters. There's no way to "cure" autism, because there's nothing to cure: it's just a way to describe a way that some people are. (Though some associated conditions, such as difficulty focusing can be treated with medication (I'd recommend not putting kids on ADHD drugs, because it's hard to distinguish between a genuine problem with cognition and mere excitable boredom from the outside.), others (e.g. hypermobility, coordination issues) can be mitigated with physiotherapy, and yet others (e.g. social anxiety, miscalibrated hunger / thirst detectors) can be alleviated with explanation, strategies, and practice.)
A good part of the differences in "severity" of their "autism symptoms" will be the extent to which they grok the things in question. For example, if you're not interested in verbal communication, you're not going to study it intensely to pick up on how other people instinctively behave, so you won't learn to imitate it. No amount of wanting what verbal communication can get you will give you the intrinsic motivation you need for (years of) extended, generalisable study – at least, not unless you happen to be good at long-chain motivation. If, however, there's a fun game you like, and playing that game involves developing proficiency in the (inherently boring) skill… well, there's a reason so many kids learn English by playing competitive video games.
I recommend you not focus overmuch on why your kids are autistic. (The most likely reason is that one or both of the biological parents are autistic.) Disabilities are contextual, and autism can be a significant disability if you want to "live a normal life", so the best approach is not to impose arbitrary constraints and unrealistic expectations on them. (And really, who wants to keep up with the Joneses, anyway? https://xkcd.com/308/)
If you're interested in the topic generally, by all means learn about it, but none of this will help your daughters. There's no way to "cure" autism, because there's nothing to cure: it's just a way to describe a way that some people are. (Though some associated conditions, such as difficulty focusing can be treated with medication (I'd recommend not putting kids on ADHD drugs, because it's hard to distinguish between a genuine problem with cognition and mere excitable boredom from the outside.), others (e.g. hypermobility, coordination issues) can be mitigated with physiotherapy, and yet others (e.g. social anxiety, miscalibrated hunger / thirst detectors) can be alleviated with explanation, strategies, and practice.)
A good part of the differences in "severity" of their "autism symptoms" will be the extent to which they grok the things in question. For example, if you're not interested in verbal communication, you're not going to study it intensely to pick up on how other people instinctively behave, so you won't learn to imitate it. No amount of wanting what verbal communication can get you will give you the intrinsic motivation you need for (years of) extended, generalisable study – at least, not unless you happen to be good at long-chain motivation. If, however, there's a fun game you like, and playing that game involves developing proficiency in the (inherently boring) skill… well, there's a reason so many kids learn English by playing competitive video games.