title: Kurt Goldstein on autism; exploring a person-centered style of psychiatric thought.
abstract: Autism research is facing profound difficulties. The lack of clinically valuable translations from the biomedical and neurosciences, the variability and heterogeneity of the diagnostic category, and the lack of control over the 'autism epidemic,' are among the most urgent problems facing autism today. Instead of encouraging the prevailing tendency to intensify neurobiological research on the nature of autism, I argue for an exploration of alternative disease concepts. One conceivable alternative framework for understanding disease and those we have come to call autistic, can be found in the work of neurologist Kurt Goldstein (1878-1965). His person-centered approach provides radically new ways to investigate and intervene with the behavior we are accustomed to explain by the elusive entity called autism.
authors.affiliation: Theory and History of Psychology, University of Groningen, Grote Kruisstraat 2/1, 9712 TS, Groningen, The Netherlands. berendverhoeff@gmail.com.|Dr. Leo Kannerhuis, Centre for Expertise, Research and Treatment of Autism, Derkinderenstraat 10-18, 1062 DB, Amsterdam, The Netherlands. berendverhoeff@gmail.com.
authors.forename: Berend
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Verhoeff
mesh_terms: D000067877:Autism Spectrum Disorder / Q000209:etiology*; D001321:Autistic Disorder / Q000209:etiology*; D049673:History, 20th Century; D006801:Humans; D011570:Psychiatry / Q000266:history*
keywords: Autism; Disease concepts; Kurt Goldstein; Normality; Style of thought