Autism is a lifelong developmental disability which affects the development of social, communication and imagination skills. It presents itself in varying degrees of severity and touches the lives of some 520,000 children and adults in the UK.

This complex condition affects four times as many boys as girls, has no ethnic or social regard and is a lifelong condition for which there is no cure.

PLEASE NOTE

• Not all individuals with an Autistic Spectrum Disorder "live in their own world"

• Parents do not cause their children to have Autism.

• Just because individuals with Autism have a developmental delay it does not mean they cannot be taught what they are lacking.

• Many children with Autism are very, very intelligent.

HISTORY OF DIAGNOSIS (Autism and Asperger Syndrome)

Leo Kanner, a child psychiatrist, published a paper in 1943 in which he described a group of children who displayed marked solitariness and an inability to relate to others. He further described these children as presenting an "obsessive desire for sameness, an insistence upon repetitive activities and poor language development".

In 1944 Hans Asperger, a doctor specialising in paediactrics wrote and presented a paper in which he described having made contact with a number of boys who had "poor social interaction skills, difficulties with the social use of language and an inability to understand gesture and facial expression".

Having studied the work of both Kanner and Asperger, Lorna Wing's research (1981 and 1991) found significant similarities between the children described by Asperger and Kanner, the key difference was that the children described by Asperger had developed grammatical use of speech in infancy (although not used for interpersonal communication). Wing concluded that half the population she would describe as having the characteristics of Aspergers Syndrome had not developed speech at the normal age. Wing investigated further and found core difficulties in Aspergers' children were also shared by those of Kanner (What is Aspergers Syndrome). However unlike Kanner's group the Asperger children were seen to be intellectually able but they experienced significant social difficulties.

THE TRIAD OF IMPAIRMENTS

Wing and Gould (1979) concluded that the difficulties characteristically associated with Autism could be described as a "triad of social impairments"

IMPAIRMENT OF SOCIAL INTERACTION

-Problems with engaging in reciprocal social interactions

An individual diagnosed to be severely affected will often be aloof with other people. Someone with a milder diagnosis of Autism will often passively engage is social contact however not make spontaneous approaches.

IMPAIRMENT OF SOCIAL COMMUNICATION

-Problems with the use and pleasure of communication will always be present in some form or another. A large proportion of people with "classical" autism will not have the use of full speech. Those who do develop the use of speech will often not appreciate the thoughts and feelings of others and use speech in terms of their own needs. This group will have difficulty in appreciating emotions, ideas and beliefs of other people.

IMPAIRMENT OF SOCIAL IMAGINATION, FLEXIBLE THINKING AND IMAGINATIVE PLAY

-Lack of understanding and ability to engage in imaginative play with toys, objects children or adults.

Often play will be either completely absent or if conducted will be of a repetitive manner. If play is engaged it will often be copied from elsewhere, for example from a TV programme. Although the child may be engaging in play, close observation will discover this is very structured to what they have learnt beforehand and there will be no use of imagination.

OVERVIEW

Autism is a developmental delay; those with autism have not developed in the same way as non autistic people. As children develop they begin to be curious about the world around them, watching faces to judge the persons mood reactions etc pointing at objects and asking "whats that?"

Some children with Autism may begin to develop in this way but "lose" the skills by the time they reach around the age of two. Others never develop the skills and others develop the skills but do not use them correctly.

Autism is a complex disability because individuals can be affected by their autism to greater and lesser degrees. For example some children with Autism don't speak, whilst others seem to be reaching all developmental milestones until it is noticed that their speech and perception of social "rules" is odd. That is why we refer to a spectrum when discussing the disorder.

This article was written by staff and volunteers of Action for ASD and should not be used to self diagnose a child or adult. If you suspect a person as having an Autistic Spectrum Disorder, please contact your GP or Health Advisory Team.

Information sourced from "The Handbook of Autism" Maureen Aarons and Tessa Gittens