TY - CHAP M1 - Book, Section TI - Chapter 92. Autistic Spectrum Disorders A1 - Reiff, Michael I. A2 - Rudolph, Colin D. A2 - Rudolph, Abraham M. A2 - Lister, George E. A2 - First, Lewis R. A2 - Gershon, Anne A. Y1 - 2011 N1 - T2 - Rudolph's Pediatrics, 22e AB - In 1943 Leo Kanner, a child psychiatrist, described a group of children with extreme aloofness and “total indifference” to other children, which he labeled autistic disturbances of affective contact. His description is as relevant today as it was back then: “The children use (language) for the purpose of communication. . . . When sentences are formed, they are for a long time mostly parrot-like repetitions of heard word combinations. They are sometimes echoed immediately. . . .” “There is a limitation in the variety of his spontaneous activities. . . . The dread of change and incompleteness seems to be a major factor in the explanation of the monotonous repetitiousness and the resulting variety of spontaneous activity.”1 Hans Asperger independently described children who demonstrated symptoms similar to Kanner’s patients but had higher cognitive and verbal skills. The conceptualization of this disorder has since broadened, and the most recent version of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders2 describes pervasive developmental disorders (PDDs). These include 3 autism spectrum disorders (ASDs): autistic disorder, Asperger disorder, and pervasive developmental disorder not otherwise specified (PDD-NOS). Two other diagnoses, Rett syndrome and childhood disintegrative disorder are also included in the DSM-IV-TR but are not considered ASDs. SN - PB - The McGraw-Hill Companies CY - New York, NY Y2 - 2024/10/10 UR - accesspediatrics.mhmedical.com/content.aspx?aid=6738890 ER -