The end of autism?

摘要

It's 70 years since Kanner first wrote about 'autistic disturbances of affective contact', but as contributors to October's special issue 'Autism: Myth and reality' pointed out, autism is still a puzzle. Several authors mentioned the probable existence of autisms (plural), but still referred to 'the condition', 'having autism' or to 'sub-types of autism' (all singular). The terminology we use by default reinforces an implicit assumption that autistic characteristics must have something in common at the biological as well as the behavioural level. It's this assumption that in my view is largely responsible for autism remaining an enigma.