Understanding Autism

Class 1Fall 2013

Brief History 1911 Eugene Blueler 1943 Leo Kanner 1944 Hans Asperger 1952 DSM-I (diagnosed under the schizophrenic reaction, childhood type) 1965 National Society for Autistic Children (later named Autism Society

of America) 1965 Ivar Lovaas and ABA 1967 The Empty Fortress 1968 DSM-II (diagnosed under the schizophrenic reaction, childhood

type…the word autistic referenced under this label) 1971 JADD started 1972 TEAACH founded 1979 Wing and Gould suggest autism is spectrum 1980 DSM-III infantile autism 1987 DSM-III-R autistic disorder 1988 Rain Man 1989 ADOS published 1994 DSM-IV Pervasive Developmental Disorder, encompasses 5

diagnoses 1994 NAAR founded 1995 CAN founded 1997 NIH CPEA network started, followed by STAART and ACE 2000 IMFAR starts 2005 Autism Speaks 2013 DSM-5 Autism Spectrum Disorders

Brief Overview: What we know Autism is a neurobiological disorder characterized by

impairments in social communication and restricted/repetitive behaviors.

Is diagnosed in boys 3-4 more times than girls. Autism is found in all social class levels and in all racial/ethnic

groups. Behaviorally based interventions are effective at improving

outcomes. Most interventions are associated with improvements for SOME

children. No interventions show improvement for ALL children. There are no genetic or biological tests to diagnose autism. Autism has a strong genetic component. What we know is limited by our cultural lens/perspective

Different Ways of Knowing• Experience and Observation

• Scientific method• Personally experienced with the senses

• Reason• Making inferences from previously acquired

knowledge

• Faith

• Testimony • Word of mouth• By an authority

The Refrigerator Mother Theory

Eugene Bleuler, coins term autism from greek word autos meaning self

Sigmund Freud publishesThe Interpretation of Dreams

Leo Kanner publishes first report of autism

Bruno Bettelheim publishes The Empty Fortress

1899

1967

1943

1911

1977

Susan Folstein publishes twin study of autism

1953

Francis & Crick discover double helix

Activity

Huh? How does this relate?

Huh? How does this relate?

Autism is disorder of social cognition. Social cognition is the ability to detect, attend to, and

process social information in the environment, and to use this information to guide behavior.

The first stimuli (first sentence) has to be detected, attended to, processed, then used to guide behavior, reproduce in picture form. This is repeated back and forth.

This is static, plenty of time, few dimensions, not happening as dynamically, quickly, or as complicated as a social interaction.