British Journal of Disorders of Communication 24, 107-121 (1989)
© The College of Speech Therapists, London
D. V. M. Bishop
Department of Psychology, University of Manchester
The diagnostic criteria for autism have been refined and made more objective since Kanner first described the syndrome, so there is now reasonable consistency in how this diagnosis is applied. However, many children do not meet these criteria, yet show some of the features of autism. Where language development is impaired, such children tend to be classed as cases of developmental dysphasia (or specific language impairment) whereas those who learn to talk at the normal age may be diagnosed as having Asperger's syndrome. It is argued that rather than thinking in terms of rigid diagnostic categories, we should recognise that the core syndrome of autism shades into other milder forms of disorder in which language or non-verbal behaviour may be disproportionately impaired.
Key words: autism, Asperger's syndrome, semantic-pragmatic disorder.
Christopher, aged 4 years, has been referred to a multidisciplinary child development centre because of concern about his failure to develop normal language and social behaviour. He is seen by a paediatric neurologist, a child psychiatrist, a speech therapist and a psychologist. At the case conference, the paediatric neurologist proposes that the child has developmental dysphasia, on the grounds that his comprehension is poor and his expressive language abnormal, but hearing is adequate, ability to do non-verbal tasks such as copying or jigsaw puzzles is good, and there are no neurological signs. The psychologist, however, thinks that the child is autistic because, as well as having a language problem, his social behaviour is poorly developed: he does not play well with other children and lacks warmth in his relationships with his parents. The child psychiatrist argues that the child's social and language abnormalities are not severe enough to warrant a diagnosis of infantile autism: he does initiate communication with others, makes eye contact and enjoys rough and tumble play, but he tends to get rejected by other children because he wants them to participate in his repetitive activities and is insensitive to their needs. Christopher can produce long and complicated sentences, but his responses to questions are often inappropriate, and he often asks questions of others while disregarding the answers he receives. The psychiatrist suggests a diagnosis of Asperger's syndrome. The speech therapist states that an analysis of Christopher's language shows that it is phonologically and grammatically normal, but there are many abnormalities in the way in which language is used, and comprehension in conversational contexts is poor. She suggests that this is a case of semantic-pragmatic disorder. The psychologist responds that semantic-pragmatic disorder is just another name for autism. A visiting American paediatrician is asked to comment on the case. She examines Christopher carefully and proposes that this is a case of PDDNOS (pervasive developmental disorder not otherwise specified).
This scenario is fictional, but illustrates the confusion that surrounds the use of diagnostic terminology in the area where neurology, psychology, psychiatry and speech therapy converge. This paper aims to examine the different diagnostic labels that are in current use, to consider how far they are applied with any consistency, how far they overlap, and whether existing terminology is adequate to account for the range of disorders encountered.
Kanner's Account of the Syndrome
In Kanner's (1943) first account of autism, he stated that the
condition he described 'differs. markedly and uniquely from anything
reported so far'. In this paper, he did not attempt to specify
strictly defined diagnostic criteria, but presented detailed case
histories of eight boys and three girls, noting the following
characteristic features:
1. Inability to relate to people, including members of the child's own family, from the beginning of life.
2. Failure to develop speech or abnormal, largely non-communicative use of language in those who did speak. Pronoun reversal was observed in all children who could speak (eight cases), and echolalia, obsessive questioning and ritualistic use of language in several.
3. Abnormal responses to environmental objects and events, such as food, loud noises and moving objects. Kanner viewed the child's behaviour as governed by an anxiously obsessive desire for the maintenance of sameness, which led to a limitation in the variety of spontaneous activity.
4. Good cognitive potential with excellent rote memory and normal performance on the non-verbal Seguin form board test.
5. Normal physical status. Several children were clumsy in gait but all had good fine muscle coordination.
Many psychiatrists found that the clinical picture described by Kanner fitted puzzling cases they had observed in their own clinics, but progress in documenting and understanding autism did not follow smoothly. Kanner (1965) complained of two related trends in child psychiatry. Some child psychiatrists did not accept that autism was a distinctive syndrome, and suggested it was fruitless to draw sharp dividing boundaries between autism and other types of atypical development. Others accepted that autism was a syndrome, but applied this fashionable diagnosis far too widely. '...it became a habit to dilute the original concept of infantile autism by diagnosing it in many disparate conditions which show one or another isolated symptom found as a part feature of the overall syndrome. Almost overnight, the country seemed to be populated by a multitude of autistic children.' Wing (1976) noted that yet others interpreted Kanner's summary of the features of his syndrome far too narrowly, so that autism would not be diagnosed unless the child showed no sign of awareness of other people, despite the fact that none of Kanner's own cases was this severely impaired. To add to the confusion, there was a continuing argument as to how far autism corresponded to an early form of schizophrenia, a debate -that was not helped by the fact that there was little agreement as to the nature and diagnosis of schizophrenia itself.
Specification of Diagnostic Criteria
Rutter (1978a) documented the chaos that reigned for some
years after Kanner's early report, with a wealth of terminology
(e.g. infantile autism, childhood psychosis, childhood schizophrenia)
being applied inconsistently to children who had some or all of
the clinical features of Kanner's early cases.
Rutter discussed the question of how far autism could be regarded
as a syndrome and how it related to other conditions. He concluded
that, although there were still many unsettled questions, in order
to avoid ambiguity, investigators should adopt the following criteria
in relation to behaviour before 5 years of age to define childhood
autism:
1. Onset before the age of 30 months.
2. Impaired social development which has a number of special characteristics
and is out of keeping with the child's intellectual development.
3. Delayed and deviant language development which also has certain
defined features and which is out of keeping with the child's
intellectual level.
4. Insistence on sameness, as shown by stereotyped play patterns,
abnormal preoccupations or resistance to change.
Unlike Kanner, who made a clear distinction between intellectual
retardation and autism, Rutter argued that these were not mutually
exclusive diagnoses. Using conventional IQ tests to classify children,
it was found that most children who fitted the criteria of autism
were also intellectually retarded. Although this might seem at
odds with Kanner' S original report, it must be remembered that
he based his judgement of good intellectual potential on the fact
that children had good rote memory and ability to do formboard
puzzles. Later studies found that many autistic children possessed
these skills while remaining very limited in other areas of functioning.
The extent of intellectual retardation associated with autism
will affect management and prognosis, but IQ level is not nowadays
regarded as a factor in deciding whether or not the child should
be diagnosed autistic.
Rutter noted that these diagnostic criteria left many unresolved
issues, in particular the question of whether there were distinct
subtypes of autism, and how to classify children who showed some
but not all of the features of autism, but on the basis of a review
of research he made a strong case for supporting the proposed
criteria as the best available for defining the syndrome of autism
in a valid and meaningful way. Although his diagnostic criteria
have not been without their critics (Waterhouse, Fein, Nath &
Snyder, 1987), they have been widely adopted and formed the basis
for the third edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual
of Mental Disorders (DSM-III) published by the American Psychiatric
Association in 1980, and revised as DSM-III-R in 1987. In the
latest revision, the term 'autistic disorder' replaced 'infantile
autism', in recognition both of the fact that some autistic disorders
first appear in childhood, and that as autistic individuals mature
into adulthood, the term 'infantile autism' is increasingly inappropriate.
Variability in the lnterpretation of Diagnostic Criteria
This clarification of diagnostic criteria was widely welcomed
as a step forward in enabling researchers to select children with
common characteristics and to communicate with one another with
some confidence that the same condition was being referred to.
Nevertheless, points of difficulty remained when trying to apply
them.
The first was that the language used to describe symptoms requires
subjective interpretation. Consider the following description
of qualitative impairment in reciprocal social interaction:
In infancy these deficiencies may be manifested by a failure to cuddle, by lack of eye contact and facial responsiveness, and by indifference or aversion to affection and physical contact... Adults may be treated as interchangeable, or the child may cling mechanically to a specific person. (DSM-III-R)
Does this mean that the child is not autistic if he makes approaches to other people, appears to enjoy a cuddle or uses eye contact? Several authors have shown that there are many children who have a sustained impairment of social relationships but who do not physically withdraw from people and may, for instance, respond favourably to being tickled (Rutter, 1 978a; Mundy, Sigman, Ungerer & Sherman, 1986; Volkmar, Cohen & Paul, 1986). To achieve more consistency in diagnosis, it is crucial that we distinguish between abnormalities that must be present for a diagnosis of autism to be made, and behaviours that are characteristic, but not invariable features of autism. In DSM-I1I-R, the criteria for autistic disorder have been so specified that presence of one or two more normal social or communicative behaviours, such as making eye-contact or enjoying a cuddle, does not preclude the diagnosis if other aspects of reciprocal social interaction (e.g. imitation, social play or ability to make peer relationships) are clearly abnormal.
Changes in the Clinical Picture with Age
Quite apart from problems in deciding what behaviours constitute
necessary and sufficient diagnostic features, disagreements may
arise when there is a failure to appreciate how the clinical picture
may change with age. Rutter (1978a) explicitly stated that the
diagnosis should be based on behaviour before 5 years of age,
and the DSM-III-R description given above specifically mentions
that this is how social impairment presents in infancy. In his
original account, Kanner (1943) documented how autistic children
change as they grow older:
Between the ages of 5 and 6 years, they gradually abandon the echolalia and learn spontaneously to use personal pronouns with adequate reference. Language becomes more communicative, at first in the sense of a question-and-answer exercise, and then in the sense of greater spontaneity of sentence formation. Food is accepted without difficulty. Noises and motions are tolerated more than previously. The panic tantrums subside. The repetitiousness assumes the form of obsessive preoccupations. Contact with a limited number of people is established in a twofold way: people are included in the child's world to the extent to which they satisfy his needs, answer his obsessive questions, teach him how to read and to do things.
This changing clinical picture can be puzzling for the professional
who has been taught that the autistic child has a profound impairment
of social relationships and language difficulties, and is then
confronted with a 10 year old who, while socially and linguistically
odd, does try to make friends, seeks out others and engages readily
in conversation with them. In DSM-IlI-R, the changing clinical
picture is emphasised, with more examples being given of abnormal
behaviours characteristic of older children.
Lack of an ontogenetic perspective can be very confusing for parents
as well as professionals. A mother who has been told that her
3-year-old child has autism, and that this is an incurable condition,
may misinterpret this as indicating that she can expect no change
whatsoever in her child's abilities or behaviour. People with
such beliefs are particularly likely to become converts to unconventional
treatment approaches whose proponents exploit the fact that the
parents expect no change, and so are ready to attribute any that
does occur to the treatment.
Subtypes at Pervasive DevelopmentaI Disorder
The American Psychiatric Association (1980) recognised the existence
of cases which resemble autism but failed to meet the diagnostic
criteria for this condition. Concerns about classification of
such cases were addressed in the 1987 revision of DSM-I1I. In
DSM-III-R 'pervasive developmental disorder' encompasses all disorders
in which there is qualitative impairment in the development of
(1) reciprocal social interaction, (2) communication (verbal and
non-verbal) and (3) imaginative activity. Autistic disorder corresponds
to a severe form of pervasive developmental disorder with onset
in infancy or childhood, in which severe social and communicative
impairments are associated with a markedly restricted repertoire
of activities and interests. However, it is recognised that pervasive
developmental disorder can occur in less severe and prototypical
form, in which case the label pervasive developmental disorder
not otherwise specified (PDDNOS) is applied.
Asperger's Syndrome
In the UK, pervasive developmental disorder is not widely used,
but the diagnosis 'Asperger's syndrome' has become popular to
refer to individuals with some autistic features who do not fit
all the criteria for autism (Tantam, 1988). Asperger's account
of this syndrome was written 1 year after Kanner's original publication,
but was much less well known. The children described by Asperger
were characterised by pedantic and stereotyped speech, clumsiness,
obsessional interests and deficient social behaviour. Wing popularised
his work in a paper published in 1981, and noted that there were
many similarities between Asperger's syndrome and Kanner's syndrome,
making it difficult to tell if they were describing the same condition
at different levels of severity, or distinct disorders. The most
popular view seems to be that 'Asperger's syndrome' is a synonym
for autism of a less severe kind (Schopler, 1985). However,
there do seem to be some merits in retaining the term. First,
there is still debate as to how far Asperger's syndrome does overlap
with autism (Nagy & Szatmari, 1986; Szatmari, Bartolucci,
Finalyson & Krames, 1986; Rutter & Schopler, 1987). Second,
the prognosis for Asperger's syndrome is considerably better than
for classic autism. For this reason, several specialists (e.g.
Wing, 1981; Howlin, 1987) have advocated using the term 'Asperger's
syndrome', while accepting that differences from autism may well
prove to be only a matter of degree. Tantam (1988) argued that
without such a category these children are left in a diagnostic
limbo, and their problems consequently go unrecognised and uncatered
for because their deficits are not deemed severe or widespread
enough to be termed 'autistic'. The numbers of affected children
are not negligible:
Gillberg and Gillberg (1989) found that Asperger's syndrome was
about five times as common as autism. Another practical reason
for retaining the term 'Asperger 's syndrome' is that it may be
a more acceptable diagnosis for parents and professionals, many
of whom have a stereotyped view of autism based on the clinical
picture in young children (Wing, 1986).
Relationship between Autism and Developmental Language Disorder
Language abnormalities are a central symptom of autism. This raises
the question, then, of how distinct is autism from developmental
language disorder? Churchill (1972) proposed that there was no
qualitative distinction between 'developmental aphasia' and autism,
and that they differed only in degree. Wing (1976) argued that
while it is easy enough to recognise children who have the classic
syndrome described by Kanner and to differentiate these from an
equally classic case of developmental receptive language disorder,
the borderlines of these conditions are not at all clear.
If children with these problems could be arranged in an orderly series, starting from the most autistic child at one end and extending to the child who most clearly had nothing but a developmental receptive speech disorder at the other, to say where the dividing line should be drawn would need the judgement of Solomon.
This issue was addressed in a series of studies by Bartak and
his colleagues (Bartak, Rutter & Cox, 1975, 1977).
They started out by collecting from a range of special schools
and hospital units a sample of children with severe problems in
understanding spoken language, excluding any with significant
hearing loss or low non-verbal intelligence. These were then subdivided
according to Rutter's criteria into 19 who fitted the definition
of infantile autism and 23 who clearly did not, and who were referred
to as the 'developmental receptive aphasic' group. This study
confirmed that it is possible to have a severe receptive language
disorder without necessarily being autistic, and thus indicated
that the social and behavioural impairments of autistic children
cannot be simply explained away as secondary to impaired understanding
of spoken language. It also emphasised the wide-ranging nature
of the communicative problems of autistic children, which extended
to non-verbal as well as verbal communication. Kanner's view that
autistic children had adequate language competence whereas aphasic
children did not was not borne out in this study. On the contrary,
autistic children had more severe and more extensive communicative
problems than did aphasic children. Whereas the 'aphasic' children
were characterised by immature language, the autistic children
were much more likely to show deviant features, such as echolalia,
pronoun reversal, stereotyped utterances and metaphorical language.
However, although language characteristics differentiated the
autistic group from the aphasic group, there were some children
who could not be classified in either group because their behaviour
and language fell between these two categories.
In reviewing these studies, Rutter (1978b) concluded that while
there were major differences between developmental receptive aphasia
and infantile autism in severity, range and nature of language
problems, as well as in behavioural terms, the existence of cases
who were intermediate between the two conditions emphasised the
difficulty of drawing a sharp boundary. Also, he noted that with
the dysphasic as well as the autistic group the more 'autistic-like'
the language, the more 'autistic-like' was the behaviour, indicating
that degrees of autism can be talked about in children who do
not have the full syndrome. Furthermore, Rutter pointed out that
autism and language difficulties tend to segregate in the same
families, concluding that 'there are important functional links
between autism and at least some cases of "dysphasia"'.
This latter quote is illuminating in its implication that developmental
dysphasia may not be a unitary condition. The diagnosis of 'developmental
dysphasia' has traditionally been made by exclusion: in effect
this is a default category that is applied to children whose language
difficulties cannot be encompassed under another diagnostic heading.
According to Bishop and Rosenbloom (1987), the term 'developmental
dysphasia' is misleading in implying there is a unitary condition
with a single aetiology, and it would be preferable to talk more
neutrally of 'specific developmental language disorders' and to
aim to develop a subclassification of such disorders on the basis
of positive linguistic and other characteristics. It is widely
recognised that there are many children with specific language
disorders who are sociable and friendly, and show no evidence
of the ritualistic and obsessional behaviour characteristic of
autism. However, Bishop and Rosenbloom described one form of specific
developmental language disorder, referred to as 'semantic-pragmatic
disorder', that appeared to be an exception to this general rule.
In this disorder, there is delayed early language development,
but the child then develops fluent, complex speech with clear
articulation. Although receptive difficulties may dominate the
clinical picture when the child is young, leading to a diagnosis
of 'developmental receptive aphasia', as they develop, such children
might improve considerably and do well on multiple-choice comprehension
tests. Comprehension problems are still evident, however, in less
structured situations, when the children tend to give over-literal
or tangential responses. Unlike other language-impaired children,
those with this language profile tended to have mild autistic
features, but these were typically not severe enough or extensive
enough to merit a diagnosis of autism.
These clinically based observations were offered tentative support
from Rapin's (1987) preliminary account of a study of 3- to 5-year-old
children identified as having autism or developmental language
disorders. In this study, each child's disorder was categorised,
first in terms of the type of language impairment observed, and
second, in terms of whether or not the criteria for autism were
met. Thus developmental language disorder and autism were not
regarded as mutually exclusive, and both conditions could be coded
as present. Language disorders of children in this study were
categorised according to the nosological framework of Rapin and
Allen (1983), which includes a category of 'semantic-pragmatic
syndrome'. This overlaps substantially with Bishop and
Rosenbloom's 'semantic-pragmatic disorder'. (Indeed, we followed
the terminology of Rapin and Allen to avoid using alternative
terms for similar conditions, although we were reluctant to use
the word 'syndrome' with its suggestion of a diagnostic entity
with clear-cut boundaries.) Rapin reported that semantic-pragmatic
syndrome was commonly associated with autism, although language
disorders in autistic children were not restricted to this kind.
However, 7 out of 35 cases classified as having semantic-pragmatic
syndrome did not meet criteria for diagnosis of autism, confirming
that one can have this type of language disorder without the extensive
social and behavioural abnormalities necessary for a diagnosis
of autism.
What can we conclude about the relationship between autism and
developmental language disorder? So long as 'developmental dysphasia'
was regarded as a unitary condition diagnosed by exclusion, the
picture was confusing, with some suggesting similarities with
autism, and others finding marked differences. Recognition of
the diverse nature of developmental language disorders opens a
way forward. In general, it is not helpful to treat specific developmental
language disorder and autism as points on a continuum: most children
with developmental language disorders have communication problems
that are more circumscribed than those of autistic children, and
which are not associated with any abnormalities of behaviour or
sociability. However, there do appear to be some children who,
while not fitting the diagnostic criteria for autism, show some
autistic features in conjunction with language difficulties, and
these are typically those with the clinical picture of semantic-pragmatic
disorder. Because 'developmental dysphasia' is a diagnosis typically
made by default, these children have been traditionally classified
under this heading, but it is questionable whether this is expedient,
because it leads to the use of a single label to encompass very
different types of difficulty.
core syndrome, while appreciating relationships with other milder
types of disorder (Wing, 1986). It also encourages us to develop
a quantitative approach to evaluation of symptoms. For instance,
rather than simply noting that social relationships are abnormal,
we move towards assessing severity of impairment in different
areas of functioning. In effect the aim shifts from trying to
find more effective procedures for discriminating autistic from
non-autistic children to devising objective means of measuring
the constructs represented by the axes of Figure 1. This task
is complicated by the fact that the clinical picture may change
dramatically with age. Nevertheless, it seems worth working towards
a quantitative approach as this is likely to be more valuable
in prognosis than reliance on categorical labels which encompass
a wide range of severity.
The dimension labelled 'verbal communication' represents competence
in those aspects of language concerned with meaning and use. If
a further dimension corresponding to mastery of language form
(grammar and phonology) was added then other types of language
disorder could be depicted on the same diagram. It is postulated
that a cluster of children would be found with pronounced deficits
of language form, but relatively normal communicative competence
and non-verbal skills, corresponding to the traditional category
of 'developmental expressive aphasia', and that, at least in older
children, this subset would be clearly delineated from semantic-pragmatic
disorder. Children with autism would be variable on this dimension.
This model is only a theoretical device for depicting the range
of disorders that has been described clinically and the relationships
between them, and its validity remains to be demonstrated. Implicit
in this model is the notion that traditional categories such as
autism and Asperger's syndrome are not distinct disorders, hence
the depiction of traditional categories as overlapping. One way
to test this model is to adopt the research approach used by Bartak
et al. (1975), in which children who are diagnosed as fitting
different categories are compared to see how far they can be clearly
distinguished. However, it is important to recognise that our
ability to detect qualitative differences between groups will
depend on the variables we measure, and that superficial similarities
between disorders may be misleading. Gillberg (1988), for example,
noted that Rett syndrome, which has a distinctive course and clinical
picture, was for many years not recognised as different from autism
because many of the behavioural symptoms are similar. In the area
of language, there are certain neurological disorders which are
associated with verbal abnormalities that seem similar to semantic-pragmatic
disorder, e.g. Williams' syndrome (Udwin, Yule & Martin, 1987)
and hydrocephalus (Swisher & Pinsker, 1971). However, the
author's hunch is that, when analysed in detail, the language
profiles may prove to be alike only insofar as they all involve
fluent and complex speech. We must probably await the development
of more sophisticated assessment techniques before we can resolve
this question.
Progress in classification, then, pursues a meandering course,
with new developments arising both from the recognition of continuity
between conditions previously regarded as different, and discovery
of clear distinctions within pre-existing categories. Given the
current uncertainties, how, then, should we react to the type
of diagnostic dilemma posed at the start of this paper? Although
we may question the extent to which the diagnostic labels in Figure
1 correspond to distinct syndromes, they nevertheless have utility
as short-hand descriptions. In the interests of clarity of communication,
it would seem advisable to avoid using the diagnosis of autism
except for children who do fit conventional diagnostic criteria
(Rutter 1978a; American Psychiatric Association, 1987), but it
is important to recognise that the diagnosis cannot be excluded
without taking an early history, and is not ruled out just because
a child shows interest in adults or makes eye contact. Where a
child does not meet the diagnostic criteria for autism and does
develop grammatical speech at the normal age, but has in mild
to moderate form the triad of abnormalities described by Wing
(1988), a diagnosis of Asperger's syndrome seems the most appropriate.
Some psychiatrists use Asperger's syndrome more loosely to include
any child of broadly normal intelligence with autistic features
who does not meet criteria for autism, even if language is impaired.
In effect, Asperger's syndrome then becomes a synonym for the
American category 'pervasive developmental disorder not otherwise
specified'. The drawback in using the label this way is that it
encompasses a wide range of children whose educational needs will
be very variable.
The author would recommend using the term 'specific semantic-pragmatic
disorder' for children who are not autistic but who initially
present with a picture of language delay and receptive language
impairment, and who then learn to speak clearly and in complex
sentences, with semantic and pragmatic abnormalities becoming
increasingly obvious as their verbal proficiency increases. Whereas
at first they may be difficult to differentiate from other types
of language-disordered child, the pattern of verbal deficits looks
more distinctive as they grow older.
What of the accusation that 'semantic-pragmatic disorder' is just
another term for autism? A great deal of confusion and controversy
has surrounded this issue, not least because the claim that the
two categories are synonymous can be interpreted in two ways.
The more extreme interpretation is that all children who have
been diagnosed as having semantic-pragmatic disorder in fact meet
conventional diagnostic criteria for autism. It is undoubtedly
the case that the diagnosis of autism is not always made when
it is appropriate, either because of a reluctance to use this
negative label, or because of unawareness of how autism changes
with age. Nevertheless, preliminary data from Rapin's (1987) study
confirmed that a child could have a semantic-pragmatic language
disorder without necessarily meeting criteria for autism.
This whole issue is further complicated by the fact that whereas
Bishop and Rosenbloom (1987) restricted use of 'semantic-pragmatic
disorder' to children with a specific language disorder who were
not autistic, Rapin (1987) did not regard the two diagnoses
as mutually exclusive. One could say that, in effect, she used
the term 'semantic-pragmatic syndrome' to describe abnormalities
on the horizontal axis of Figure 1, so that this syndrome could
be found with or without the non-verbal social abnormalities characteristic
of autism. This is a logically defensible position, but, obviously,
misunderstanding will ensue if some people use the term as an
alternative diagnosis to autism, whilst others regard the two
labels as compatible. It is hoped that the designation specific
semantic-pragmatic disorder for non-autistic children with
this language profile will dispel some of the confusion.
There is an alternative interpretation of the claim that autism
and semantic-pragmatic disorder are the same: this statement can
be taken to mean simply that the two disorders are on a continuum
and not qualitatively distinct. On this view, any disorder falling
within the domain shown in Figure 1 can be regarded as 'autistic'.
While it may be useful to draw attention to commonalities between
disorders, extension of terminology in this way is likely to cause
more misunderstanding than clarification.
Finally, we should beware of abbreviating semantic-pragmatic disorder
to SPD, as these initials are used by psychiatrists to refer to
'schizotypal personality disorder', a category whose relationship
to autism is highly controversial (Nagy & Szatmari, 1986).
Address correspondence to Dr D. Bishop, Department of Psychology, University of Manchester, Oxford Rd, Manchester M13 9PL.
Received March 23 1989.
Author's Note:
The author will be happy to send copies of further research papers on semantic-pragmatic disorder to interested parties.
Click here for
an updated list of her publications.
However please note that, as a full time researcher she is not in a position to offer opinions, assessments or consultations on individual children.
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