A prelimary analysis of cognitive and developmental approaches in autism / Os enfoques cognitivista e desenvolvimentista no autismo: uma análise preliminar

Abstract

The diversity of clinical pictures and different theoretical approaches may explain the blurred boundaries of the concept of autism. Since Kanner, autism has been explained either as a social/affective deficit or a cognitive one. In the fruitless debate of the 1970/80s, some authors argued that the primary deficit was social/affective while others that it was in the cognitive area of language. Today the cognitive and developmental approaches predominate. The latter revives the social/affective approach to autism and dissolves the social x language opposition. One of its epistemological assumptions is to view language as a social activity because its precursors can be found in the mother-infant nonverbal communications. The purpose of this article is to begin a discussion about the importance of the epistemological assumptions of the different theoretical approaches to autism for the search of its etiology and intervention.