[Research on autism. Different aspects of changes observed during the development period]

Research on infantile autism in child psychiatry refers mainly to a concept of "non-change" and not so much to a concept of "change". Very few investigations included longitudinal perspectives. Even commonly used classifications (e.g., DSM III-R) did not consider developmental aspects. However, if we want to find better treatment approaches to help autistic children, we should try to elucidate basic developmental mechanisms concerning behavioral, biological, psychological and social factors taking into account both a concept of "change" and one of "non-change". Having in mind both the relationship between brain function and developmental psychopathology as well as the possible interaction of the two developmental concepts mentioned above, the article first clarifies terms related to maturation in children like "absolute change" (e.g., intraindividual growth) and "relative change" (e.g., growth relative to the age group). In addition, the existence of a so-called after-maturation of the CNS (i.e., absolute and relative "change") in psychiatric disordered children is illustrated by the author's neurophysiological research. In contrast, an example of absolute "change" and relative "non-change" of electrical brain activity is given, i.e., power spectra of a child are like fingerprints. Furthermore, two kinds of maturational problems are discussed (developmental deviation versus developmental retardation). On the basis of these informations, the author refers to the main topic, namely, the relationship between central nervous maturation and behavior in autistic children. It is suggested, that recent imaging techniques and progress in EEG analysis should lead to new efforts in order to further investigate the question of lateralization deficits and its relation to language problems in autistic children during their development.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)