CHANGE AND CONTINUITY IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF CHILDREN WITH AUTISM

The developmental approach to childhood psychopathology identifies dev iations from typical patterns of development and stability of individu al characteristics over time, and precursors in early life of later fu nctions. The application of this approach to the social, communicative , and cognitive development of children with autism is discussed. Resu lts from a longitudinal study of children with autism and other develo pmental disorders are described, indicating that children with autism have stable deficits in joint attention, representational play, and re sponsiveness to the emotions of others, and that early variations in t hese abilities are important for concurrent and subsequent language de velopment and for peer engagement many years later.