Parental practices and innate activity in normal, autistic, and brain-damaged infants

Infant care practices and innate activity are compared in a study of 96 families representing 33 autistic and early schizophrenic, 33 matched normal, and 30 subnormal children. Data from objectively rated interviews indicated that parents of psychotic and normal children were alike in infant care practices, total stimulation scores, and factor analytically derived scores. Parents of subnormals were the least stimulating and coldest, providing fewer contacts and less physical freedom to the infants than the other parents. Normal infants were more active but autistic and subnormal did not differ on any infant rating item. Infant factor scores showed that autistic and subnormal infants were most alike in the alertness factor, both below normal infants. Social factors did not differ. Brain damage indices were highest in subnormal and lowest in normal, all differing significantly. Results are discussed and interpreted to substantiate criticism of theories that attribute autism to parental or organic-environmental causation during infancy.