Autism and information technology: therapy with computers

Chapter 7 of Autism and Learning edited by Stuart Powell, Rita Jordan (2011).

Table of Contents

Introduction

My concern in this chapter is with computers primarily as a therapeutic and secondarily as an educational resource. Their educational potential is very well recognised, and access to computer-assisted learning is becoming progressively more widespread (some access points are listed at the end of this chapter). It is also widely recognised that an element of therapy is essential in the education of children with autism (Jordan and Powell, 1995). The boundary is blurred. I suggest that the more directly educational potential may not be accessed, especially by non-verbal children, unless the calming, controllable, aspects of working with computers have first been explored freely. What is more, that phase of exploration and discovery can be an ideal basis for communication with a sensitive helper.

My central points are that anyone with autism, from pre-school age to adult, may be very comfortable with computers, and may relate happily with any knowledgeable companion who is focusing on the computer with them. Information technology offers scope to play, explore, be creative, in a safe, highly controllable environment — and it need not make any verbal demands. Computers can thus focus attention with minimal risk of overload. They may also provide various coping strategies for people with problems of self-awareness, information connection, and memory retrieval.

The method I recommend for maximising the value of information technology for those with autism is to sit beside one at the computer (not crowding!), with a graphics program running, watching every move they make. Do not intervene unless there is a call for it! Do not try to divert the flow! Do share joy or annoyance as they occur, and comment positively on what is happening! Do help if it is called for! The end result may be a much more confident and communicative child, whose openness will be of great help to the teacher.

Why Computers Suit People with Autism So Well

Most of us most of the time have multiply divided attention: many interests simultaneously alert and ready to digest information — we have polytropic interest systems (Murray, 1995). In this way we cope relatively easily with a highly changeable environment while building up a richly connected information store. With autism, however, attention is tunnelled (Jordan and Powell, 1989), interest trapped: its objects isolated and without context — people with autism have monotropic interest systems. That makes for an alarming and unpredictable universe, and a fragmented, disconnected, information store to cope with it. (Readers can refer to the work of Courchesne, Frith, Happé and Jordan and Powell for arguments relating to attention and information processing in autism.)

Many people find computers refreshing company. I believe this is true for steeply monotropic children, that there should be the earliest possible access to information technology for all children who have been diagnosed autistic. The list below highlights those features of computing which I think distinctively appeal to people with autism, whatever their age:

Why computers suit autistic individuals

Contained, very clear-cut boundary conditions.
Naturally monotropic, (cf. Douglas Coupland’s ‘overfocused’) thus context-free.
Restricted stimuli in all sensory modalities.
Rule-governed and predictable thus controllable (despite annoying mistakes).
Safe error-making.
Highly perfectible medium.
Possibilities of non-verbal or verbal expression.
Interacts cotropically with the individual, i.e. it joins the individual’s attention tunnel, ‘starts where the child is’.

Contained, very Clear-cut Boundary Conditions

Few activities are as isolated from the constantly changing environment with its perpetually shifting and blurred distinctions as the activity of engaging with a computer. It offers a monotropic individual a strictly contained event receptacle. Everything which happens within that frame can be encompassed in a single attention-tunnel. It is a naturally monotropic medium: people who are normally relatively polytropic will tend to monotropism in front of a computer. This is the condition which Douglas Coupland calls ‘overfocussed’ in his very knowledgeable fictional accounts of life around Silicon Valley. But if a person is already in a monotropic state, working with a computer will simply reflect it, and by creating a state of relative ease will widen the attention window, not narrow it.

Context-free

A corollary of that natural boundedness is that making sense of the information presented does not require accessing external context. Most of us non-autistic people automatically integrate information into a wider context and reel off ramified relevant inferences at all times (Murray, 1986; Sperber and Wilson, 1986). It is something we have learned to do as the world has drawn us out. In our normal, flexible, polytropic state we can cope quite well with most of life’s exigencies. Those perpetually occurring cognitive effects adjust relationships between interests in adaptation to the new. We are supremely context-sensitive beings. We can even handle modelling other people whose interests are distinct from our own: a vital skill for living in society.

I believe that many cognitive effects may occur in a person who is in a monotropic state, but they will not connect with information relevant to interests outside the current one. Therefore isolation from context is always a blessed clarification for someone with autism, who is chronically monotropic. Computers singularly have this virtue, as well as offering rich potential in cognitive effects. Understanding what’s going on at any given moment requires no recourse to exotropic information, no effort at integration.

Restricted Stimuli in all Sensory Modalities

Another aspect of computing’s clear boundedness is that a strictly limited set of stimuli assails the senses. Most of the stimulus set remains stable: the hardware doesn’t change; within its fixed frame, predictable events occur in a fixed order. Information is presented as minimally as representation will allow (because that is how to get maximum performance from a limited display). Change occurs within a very narrow range of sensory possibilities, usually one step at a time.

All the visual stimuli, including the peripheral (and also proprioceptive) information from hand and keyboard or mouse, seem to be manageable within a single attention tunnel. There is no need for redirection or readjustment beyond the cursor’s movements, which are confirming the movements of the user’s hands and fingers. It is a highly simplified and positively reinforcing universe.

Rule-governed and Predictable thus Controllable

Computers provide access to their potential in a strictly rule-governed and highly reliable fashion (compared with events in the unrestricted universe outside). You can switch them off when you don’t want them, or you can change their direction yourself. You can have complete control over your perceived environment. The many children with autism who find the normal lived environment overwhelmingly unpredictable and alarming tend to find all of these features of computing strongly appealing.

Safe Error-making

Not only is the predictability of computers soothing, but they also provide a very safe environment for exploration. It is the rarest error which cannot be reversed, thanks to today’s software, and frustrations can usually be overcome. In these very favourable conditions, autistic children seem entirely capable of imaginative play, play involving the not here-and-now, play involving the creation of new situations and the discovery of new methods.

The risks of such exploration are infinitely less in terms of exposure to shock and discomfort or serious accident, than the risks of real world exploration. For one thing, nobody is likely to misunderstand, or shout about mistakes (as they might have to in many cases of real world exploration). For another, the actual consequences of error-making on a computer are rarely worse than trivial, and can almost always be overwritten even when they cannot be undone.

Highly Perfectible Medium

As well as providing ease of correction, computers also offer perfect forms to their users. As I write this, successive immaculate sans serif letters appear on the page — or I could find circles, polygons, stars, sprays, or whatever precise range of colours I chose from a huge visible array, if I switched to a graphic program. All of these can be had in flawless perfection in exchange for my perfunctory key strokes. Anyone can gain as much for as little pain.

Possibilities of Non-verbal or Verbal Expression

Expression is an outward and perceptible sign of the interest or desire current at the moment of its appearance. On this definition, verbal expressions and other shared symbols are a special case of something more general and less formal. They are special in being fixed across millions of otherwise highly variable interest systems and they make very specific demands for the attention of their hearers. Once you have got used to speech, you have allowed your interest system to become structured by those aspects of the common culture which your language embodies. In normal discourse that leaves you wide open to having your interest system taken over by other people’s words.

People with autism tend to find language invasively challenging behaviour, and not adopt it themselves as an expressive tool. Alternative means of expression will always be found. Non-verbal expressive behaviours can often be hard to accept for carers, or even physically hazardous. With Windows software it is possible to engage with a computer successfully entirely non-verbally, through icons. A great deal can be done, therefore, without encountering social/invasive problems in the symbolic realm. Even when access involves verbal items, being written rather than spoken, those items can be selected for attention at will. They do not impose in the same way as speech, do not peremptorily summon the attention.

Cotropical Interaction

In effect, because it responds to every move you make and is guided solely by your choices, a computer itself behaves very much like the ideal human companion. It responds immediately but lets you take your time. Your interest dictates everything it does. What a great friend! There is a danger here that carers will let that apparent sufficiency justify leaving their charges in the ‘care’ of their computers, but no greater risk than there always is with anything which successfully occupies a child.

In this case, the object of interest is inherently interactive, so that the child is in effect taking turns with the computer, which reflects everything the child does. It can be fascinating to watch that process, and I reiterate that doing so and supplying help and/or an interested commentary can be an invaluable way to abet your relationship with that child.

Risks

Is there not a basic danger that the computer will be so appealing to autistic individuals that they will become more autistic in relating to it? That is, both more obsessive and less interested in communicating with those around them? Firstly it should be borne in mind that in most situations nobody gets the chance to monopolise a computer. There is almost bound to be a need for turn-taking of the most basic kind, with other human beings, not just within the interaction between user and computer. Secondly, we are talking about naturally obsessive people when we discuss autism, they will single-mindedly do whatever it is they do. Thirdly, what they do on the computer obsessively may be highly creative and recognisably worthwhile — both to the person at work and to the observer. Fourthly, it can be so satisfying and generate such an easeful environment that it has a directly therapeutic effect in widening the individual’s attention window. And fifthly — yet again — it can provide a fruitful basis for mutual communication, and the motivation to pursue it. Therefore it can make for a less severe autism, a more integrated person.

Ideally, every child with autism should have a definite period every school day during which she/he will get 1:1 support at the computer. Time will necessarily be limited and shared with others. Some shared activities, like games of various sorts can be timetabled. Children with autism are likely to be at least as good at most computer games as their non-autistic peers. Such games are not widely accepted as a suitable curricular activity. But the potential for peer group prestige, normalisation, and willing co-operation and communication is huge.

Some anecdotal observations from my own experience working at the computer with my autistic friend, Ferenc, and from that of Rosemarie and Les Mason, whose large family has profited greatly from its early exposure to information technology, will support these points.

Ferenc is a student at a special school for children with autism in North London, where he has been since he was six. He is classically autistic and has chosen not to go on using the limited spoken vocabulary he used to deploy (in both English and Hungarian) when I first met him as an 11 year old.

When the head of his special school, Bert Furze, urged me to befriend one of his pupils, it suited my own intentions very well — though I wasn’t at all sure how to go about it. Happily in Ferenc I found someone whose interests I share. We both like nature, light, refraction and reflection, find beauty in them. We both like controlling material: making things, melting things, making sparks fly; we both relish the potential of computer graphics.

I do a variety of things with Ferenc which give him the opportunity to take control — something he evidently finds satisfying. I try to provide a safe environment for him to explore. One of the most fulfilling activities for him has been time spent using fairly simple, but productive, graphic programs on a school computer. Because I had access to it — and perhaps also thanks to Nottingham’s wonderful A for Autism animation — I introduced Ferenc to an animation program, when he was 14.

The first time we sat down to do an animation, I showed him a 16 frame one that my son had done. I played it through, then played it frame by frame, backwards and forwards. Ferenc watched with fascination. I asked him if he wanted to make an animation. He nodded with enthusiasm. So I explained what I had found out from my son about how to prepare to make a ‘flic’. First you have to set a length by typing in a number: Ferenc reached across and keyed in ‘999999’ until the space was filled up. I explained I thought the computer couldn’t handle that, so we opted for 30 plus.

I sat and watched everything he did, as is usual in our encounters — he minds if I don’t. Ferenc used a polygon facility which he knew from school, to make a green figure, placed differently in each successive frame. After 16 frames he paused and ran it through. It was a bit too animated, jumping unintelligibly from frame to frame. Without hesitation he carried on again, this time he kept the polygon rectangular and only slightly varying in size and took it on a journey round the edge of the screen, and then shrank it step by step and made it larger again. When he played it back, the rectangle marched smoothly round the border then angled off into the distance, then back.

‘It looks to me as though it’s going away and coming back again, is that how it looks to you?’

He gave me an emphatic nod.

On a later occasion, Ferenc spent some time learning from my son, both watching him doing things, and listening with apparent understanding to suggestions. Then I introduced him to my colleague Mike Lesser, who knows the program really well, and had the facilities for us to record everything Ferenc did on the computer, by downloading every screen onto video. Ferenc appeared to have a very good time round at Mike’s. When I asked him a few weeks later if he liked Mike he affirmed it strongly. It took me a lot of intensive attention and care over a period of many months to build up the good relationship I have with Ferenc. But with the computer as a communication focus and motivator an excellent relationship was forged between him and Mike within minutes of their meeting. Mike knows how to show Ferenc aspects of the program he might otherwise miss, and can help him understand and control what’s going on.

The first time, we successfully make two copies of his work, one for him, one for us, and he takes his home with him. That is unusual, since Ferenc will hardly ever agree to take anything home either from school or from when he’s out with me. The second time, the technology isn’t quite sorted: there is only one recording. I say, ‘Oh, Ferenc, would it be all right if I took this home with me and gave it back to you on Monday morning?’ (the day after the morrow). He shakes his head vigorously. Feeling very vexed (mainly with Mike), I grit my teeth and leave the room. Meanwhile, as I learn later, Mike goes up to Ferenc, who is holding the successful cassette, and eyeballs him with, ‘Ferenc, you know Dinah really really wants it too…’. The next moment, Ferenc finds me in the kitchen. Clutching the cassette to him, he leans towards me, and makes an obviously strenuous attempt to extend the cassette in my direction. I say, ‘Oh, is it all right then, if I take it home…?’ He shakes his head as vigorously as ever. I shrug, and tell him never mind — resigned to never seeing it again.

Next time, we successfully (largely thanks to the help of Stuart Powell) set up a pair of recordings direct from the computer, plus an outside camcorder filming Ferenc himself, and our interactions with him. That was the session which resulted in the short video film we have made: Working with Ferenc (for a copy of this video, please apply directly to the author). When he has completed his animation, he gets up and goes to get Mike, and reaches out to shake Mike’s extended hand when congratulated. At the end of that session, when I offer him his cassette, he refuses it, indicating that it is mine. I am very touched, as I am when he has pushed across the table towards me, the last four Ferrero Rochers (until then I’d had just one). Earlier, when I’d bought them, I’d asked him to remember that I like them too. It seems that he did remember.

Ferenc is far from being the only autistic person who shows creative imagination, pride in achievement, and a desire to communicate in relation to work on a computer. Rosemarie and Les Mason’s youngest son addressed his first words to a computer, during a game. He has gone on to talk quite fluently, and display all manner of computing skills. He has two autistic older brothers, too, one of whom has been an adept all along. The other one was the most extremely autistic member of the family, much given to tapping and banging: Sean.

There are three computers in play in this family of five (currently, aged between 6 and 11) and until recently, all the children except Sean were to some extent adepts. His parents thought of getting Sean a ‘concept’ keyboard — with minimal, large, key pads — or possibly a touch screen.

Then, when just turned seven, Sean went and got his mother and led her to a computer. She thought that he was wanting her to do something for him — since that had been the case on every previous occasion throughout his life. But in fact he pushed her aside when she began to grapple with the hardware, and showed her that he could access a graphic program with the mouse, that he could use the mouse competently — indeed, more competently than could she. He drew rainbows, appropriately coloured. Later he used the keyboard to type in numbers from 1 to 10. Away from the computer, soon after this breakthrough, Sean spontaneously began colouring in — something which had never occurred in him before.

One night, when she thought they were all in bed, Rosemarie went upstairs and suddenly realised that all the children were gathered round a computer together in the dark. The oldest daughter was at the controls of a game which they were all intently involved in watching, and about which they were communicating.

Adults with autism can clearly benefit, too. In a residential home run by Autism London, a computer was recently installed for staff. Within a week, half the residents had used the new machine. The special benefits that can bring both people with autism and their carers are listed here.

Therapeutic and educational benefits of interacting with computers

Anyone with autism is happy to accept positive cotropical attention: computer monitors, with their precise cursor movements, greatly facilitate the would-be sharer’s ability to recognise the individual’s current focus of interest, i.e. computers make joining in really easy.
If someone else is joining in, they and their cotropical interventions may be highly welcome.
The autistic individual’s long-term acceptance and concern for the sharer may in turn be enhanced or initiated by these interactions.
The autistic individual may become motivated to show and share their achievements.
The autistic individual may become motivated to speak, to the computer, or to another.
The autistic individual may become motivated to read.
The autistic individual may key in to cause and effect.
By presenting autistic individuals with outward manifestations of their thoughts, computers may potentiate reflection (Jordan and Powell, 1990; Williams, 1992).
By giving autistic individuals power and scope, as well as potentiating reflection, it may help develop agency and self-awareness and greatly increase their self-esteem, and optimism.
Using a computer with an autistic individual may greatly increase the sharer’s respect and optimism, by revealing unobvious purposeful intelligence.

Cotropical Engagement Facilitated

‘Start where the child is’ can be hard advice to follow if the child is into headbanging or walking back and forth along the cracks between floorboards or ceaselessly tapping and banging or throwing everything behind the sofa. Even when someone is willing to try to tune in to those activities or others, it is not always possible to work out exactly what does occupy the child’s interest, or how to join in with it or make relevant comments which are not unwelcome. Since that is a key to any relationship, it is of high importance in establishing the especially difficult one between autistic and non-autistic people.

Just as when people are watching a sport, it is easy to see exactly what their focus of attention is, so it is at the computer. It can be easily and precisely tuned in to, and anyone who joins the fan’s attention tunnel will be welcome there. Distractions, exotropic stimuli of all kinds from irrelevant words to irrelevant police sirens outside, will be unwelcome. So long as the interactor keeps all comments as relevant as possible, does not try to put own interest to the fore, then that person will be an agreeable presence. If observers can also offer a little guidance through the software — doing their best to offer only when a perceived pause occurs — then their presence will be doubly welcome. Together, they and their autistic companion will have constructively resolved a problem. It will have gone beyond social acceptance to active engagement and effective communication.

The interactor has gone 90% of the way, but just by deploying a mouse for their own satisfaction the user has created a series of expressions which have come part way to meet the attentive other. The computer provides a sort of neutral interface through which communications can occur much more easily than is normal in autism. It takes no special effort from the user, indeed no communicative intention whatever is needed from them. And it takes much less communicative effort than usual for the carer to be confidently cotropical. Mike was able to hit it off with Ferenc first time because of all this. Any carer who is not intimidated by computers has the possibility that with their aid effective communication may take place between them and their autistic charge.

Good Communication and Mutual Concern

Carers who have worked at cotropicality may be rewarded, as I have, by finding some signs of concern for their well-being emerging. Ferenc trying to give me the video because he knew I wanted it, and his retaining that concern over many weeks so as to press the next one on me straight away, strike me as being such signs (for more about Ferenc see Murray, 1995). His willingness to relinquish to Mike his CD cases (Ferenc likes clear plastic), and his willingness to give Mike attention at the computer interface, even when not immediately furthering his own aims, plus his enthusiastic assent to the question of whether he liked Mike, all suggest that he has some level of positive feeling towards Mike as a distinct individual. I believe this feeling is motivated by the delight of having one’s interests furthered, which somehow fans warm feelings towards the source of the delight. Those warm feelings seem to last beyond the bounds of the happy situation.

If part of what we hope to do in relating to people with autism is create a genuinely two-sided relationship, we may need to start in this very one-sided fashion, letting the other’s interests lead, at least some of the time. Awareness of your distinctive otherness, and its value, may be initiated or enhanced. With it, perhaps, some clearer sense of self may emerge in the child (see Hobson, 1993 and for more on this issue from a ‘theory of mind’ perspective, see Leslie and Frith, 1985).

Motivation to Show

Awareness of the other as sharer of one’s interests, awareness of the possibility that an other may wish to join one’s attention tunnel, and belief that the object in question is of value — these seem to be prerequisites of the desire to show. In his teens, Ferenc has often evinced that desire to share his view or his achievement, not just with me but with familiar staff at school. But he also wanted to show what he had done to Mike, a comparative stranger, noted with apparent gratification how impressed Mike was, and held out his hand to be shaken when Mike urged him to.

And there is Sean’s example as well: the first time he spontaneously got his mother and took her somewhere to show her something was to show her his achievements on the screen. It seems that a sense of personal achievement may also be part of this activity of directing the other’s attention (see below).

Motivation of Speech

Although our interactions do not involve Ferenc being actively verbal, I do talk about what’s going on or what I think the possibilities might be. He gives every appearance of reaction to relevant suggestions. So long as I direct my words along the trajectory of his interest he seems to understand quite complex utterances. The same is true for his interactions at the computer with Mike. So the computer work can promote verbal awareness even if, as in this case, it does not spur the person with autism to active language use. But computers can do that, witness the case of Sean’s little brother who had uttered no word until he called out to the computer — now he talks to anyone, and still to the machine!

Motivation to Read

Much software has a verbal component in its use, and must promote at least awareness of verbal forms, if not any grasp of the logic of their component parts, or their meaning in other contexts. Perhaps after a while, sufficient exposure to written words, along with the potential to survey them at one’s leisure and the motivation to do so, may sometimes result in the development of genuine reading. And perhaps that, combined with the easily accessible keyboard full of letters which appear perfectly formed on the screen, may contribute to motivate writing, too. I have no case study evidence to offer on this point; these suggestions are a priori.

Potentiation of Reflection

Whether employing verbal or non-verbal expression, the movements of the cursor are punctuated by decisions which leave a trail on the screen. Just as this renders the agent’s interests visible to an outside observer, so it renders them visible to the agent. Most of us, I believe, generate self-awareness out of other-awareness and learn reflection from that duality. It creates the psychological gap necessary before an attempt can be made to look back with a perspective. Without that gap, recollection is probably mainly a matter of reviving a feeling state with no possibility of taking a view of that state, let alone controlling it or comparing it with any alternative states. Planning would go no further than the imagination could take it within the sphere of a single interest, and would presumably anticipate only the desired outcome and not any alternatives.

Awareness of Cause and Effect

Since almost every key stroke has an effect, and that effect is predictable, the notion that those key strokes play a causal role seems utterly transparent. If there is a need to teach the concept of cause and effect, access to a computer should provide an ideal means.

Awareness of Agency and Self

The fingers tapping the mouse buttons or keys, and feeling them yield, the eyes seeing the cursor move, and the feeling of satisfaction at all this, all co-occur over and over again. They do so in a relatively permanent medium which presents their results to the agent of their production — just as it does to any observer. Agents can observe their own agency, and can do so in their own time.

The computer is almost like a doppelganger (I owe this observation to Dr Jeff Mason, who has contributed a philosophical viewpoint to the discussions of mind, with Mike Lesser and others, which underlie the position presented here), an outward presentation of oneself — a chance to see one’s self in a new sort of mirror in which time leaves a trail, and purpose is visible.

When computers also function as communication interface with another human being, then they will also help build awareness of the companionable other. A full appreciation of one’s own agency must surely include awareness of a distinction between others’ causal roles and one’s own. Probably two-person games are among the best ways of fostering this vital aspect of self-awareness. Being socially rewarding within the peer group at school (or at home), and necessarily involving turn-taking, must underscore anyone’s awareness of their own distinctness, and value as a person.

Self-esteem, Optimism

A burgeoning, strengthening, sense of self may arise out of being an agent of successful creations. Appreciation firstly of one’s own causal role and secondly of the value of its results, must go a long way towards sustaining a sense of distinctive and lasting individual potency. That must, I believe, be a crucial component of selfhood — and a vital motivator in the desire to show others one’s results. The esteem of others, and their voiced appreciation — whether they are carers, siblings or peer group members — reinforces the self-esteem.

That confident power is a prerequisite of the optimistic attitude everyone needs to get through a hard world without depression. Perhaps teenage and adult autistic depression would be less commonplace if computers were more commonplace.

Carer Optimism and Respect

Autistic behaviours can be distressing for carers, and the long-term prospects can look so bleak, despair can be inviting. Although I appreciated Ferenc’s graphic skills enough to connect him with that animation program, I had no idea he would do so much so fast. Although Sean’s mother felt sure of his intelligence and had faith in his potential, she had no idea he’d be able to use a mouse, let alone a keyboard. Now he’s communicating more, and tapping and banging less — and his carers feel deeply encouraged by his evidently happy progress.

Seeing these normally asocial beings communicating effectively is on its own enough to promote carer optimism. Seeing their sometimes splendid creations, and realising one’s own inferiority, can also be an eye-opener! As autistic behaviours go, playing with a computer must be one of the most widely acceptable. So carers will also have the pleasure of seeing their charges behaving, without any coercion, in a way which ‘fits in’. And they may have the delight of having the individual with autism actually wishing to share and show their achievements.

Next Steps

Make sure every class with an autistic child in it has at least one computer, preferably two. (Ideally every home — natural or residential — with an autistic individual should also have at least one computer.) To start with, any old computer with some graphics software will do. Use the child’s achievements to argue for latest and best from your education authority — it can only be in their interests as much as the child’s. Train staff or acquire volunteers who will provide the necessary support. The helpful and observant companionship I am advocating can be practised at once by anyone. But a person with some prior familiarity with the software will be much better placed to build up with the autistic person, the kind of warm mutual feelings that help the rest of us put up with each other and keep us cheerful. Accessing such feelings seems particularly hard for people with autism, and may also be particularly valuable for them. Carers should try to stay one step ahead so they can provide effective support.

Many children will find the whole experience so confidence boosting and relaxing, that their most world-excluding autistic behaviours — like Sean’s tapping and banging — will occur less frequently. And, as Rutger van der Gaag of the Veldwijk Research Institute in the Netherlands puts it, the more at ease the individual is the larger their attention window, i.e. the window through which information can be taken in.

Once that comfortable relationship with computers has been established, their strictly educational potential can be accessed, individual learning programs devised, and so on (see Cenmac and NCET in Appendix). Many people with autism may go on to use modems, access the Internet, and achieve a new sort of normalisation thereby. The educational, and in particular auto-didactic, possibilities are limitless. But it is their role as communication interface with people in the same space, which may prove their most valuable contribution to people who live with autism.

Entitlement to access to information technology should follow from a number of United Nations declarations, notably from the Charter for Persons with Autism. The following conspicuously apply:

The right of people with autism to live independent and full lives.
Their right to the equipment, assistance and support services necessary to live a fully productive life with dignity and independence.
Their right to participate and benefit from culture, entertainment, and recreation.
Their right to equal access to and use of all facilities, services and activities in the community.
Their right to accessible and appropriate education.

We have an obligation to provide all those to these sensitive and vulnerable people. Who knows what potential we may reveal by doing so.

Acknowledgements

Thanks to Paul Shattock and everybody else who makes Durham a worthwhile event and genuine exchange of ideas. Thanks to Ferenc Virag for being himself, and Mike Lesser likewise. Thanks to Stuart Powell and Sarah Libby for organising me into attending their workshop; thanks to Rita Jordan, and Stuart again, for commissioning me to pursue questions about computers and autism, and Colin Nimmo likewise. Thanks to everybody at Harborough School and at my workplace, carers and cared for, for their patience and good nature. Thanks to Johan Baker for her observations on spittle, and to Helen Tworkowski for hers on empathy. And special thanks to Rosemarie Mason (of Redbridge Autistic Families Together — RAFT) for giving me so much wonderful feedback from real life in her extraordinary family, and for all the benefits her energy is bringing the world of autism. And thanks to Lesley Rahamin, Glyn Holt and Mike Blamires, for their interest, knowledge and enthusiasm.

References

Courchesne, E. (1996) ‘Abnormal cerebellar activity in autism alters cortical and subcortical systems’. Paper presented at the Fifth Congress Autism-Europe (Hope is not a Dream), Barcelona, May.
Dawson, G. (ed.) (1989) Nature, Diagnosis and Treatment of Autism. London: Guilford Press.
Frith, U. (1989) Autism: Explaining the Enigma. Oxford: Blackwell.
Happé, F. (1994) Autism: an Introduction to Psychological Theory. London: UCL Press.
Hobson, P. (1993) Autism and the Development of Mind. London: Erlbaum.
Jordan, R.R. & Powell, S.D. (1989) The Special Curriculum Needs of Autistic Children: Learning and Thinking Skills. London: Association of Head Teachers of Autistic Children and Adults.
Jordan, R.R. and Powell, S.D. (1995) Understanding and Teaching Children with Autism. Chichester: Wiley.
Leslie, A.M. & Frith, U. (1987) ‘Metarepresentation and autism: how not to lose one’s marbles’. Cognition, 27, 291–294.
Murray, D.K.C. (1995) ‘An autistic friendship’, in Proceedings of the International Conference — Psychological Perspectives in Autism, Durham University, published by the Autism Research Unit, University of Sunderland.
Sperber, D. & Wilson, D. (1986) Relevance, Communication and Cognition. Oxford: Blackwell.

Appendix

Leslie Rahamin — CENMAC (Centre for MicroAssisted Communication)
Eltham Green Complex, 1A Middle Park Avenue, Eltham SE9 5HL

Glyn Holt (Learning Disabilities) — NCET (National Council for Educational Technology)
Milburn Hill Road, Science Park, Coventry CV4 7JJ

Jim Wobus’ website for autism contacts generally: web.syr.edu [now at http://www.autism-resources.com]

Commentary

Education as Therapy

In the opening paragraph, the author makes the point that education for children with autism necessarily involves an element of therapy and, further, that a computer-based learning environment is well suited to such an endeavour. We have argued this point elsewhere (Powell and Jordan, 1996) and perhaps it is worth examining evidence and exploring any implications here in the light of Murray’s descriptions of learning in a computer environment.

There is a sense in which attempts at educating any child have to take account of that child’s learning style and abilities (along with a number of other social and emotional factors). This truism takes on a particular significance in autism because of the fundamental way in which the thinking and learning of the individual with autism differs from that of the non-autistic in that, essentially, non-autistic learning is a social activity. There is a natural tension, then, between teaching, which is typically conceived of as a cultural activity involving the social construction of meaning, and autistic learning, which is necessarily of an asocial kind. In the sense that meaning is socially constructed, then the world remains meaningless for the individual for whom social construction remains opaque. Of course there is meaning for the individual with autism, but it is one which is derived from idiosyncratic origins and which remains personal and disconnected from the social world.

What Murray describes in her chapter is a learning environment which can be to an extent determined by the learner. It is an environment which is not necessarily socially mediated. How can this environment be described as therapeutic? The way in which Murray describes the advantages of the computer environment, and later her own interactions with Ferenc, in part answers this question. The computer is not an immediate part of any social scenario. Certainly, it can become one, and indeed it can be designed to be one. But it starts out as a thing to act upon, and one which responds in a predictable way. Two people acting upon this thing then are not necessarily engaged with each other. The therapy, if there is any, is in the way in which the computer (or more properly the computer program) exists as an entity which enables two people to engage with each other because they are in fact engaging with this third party, this inanimate, asocial, reflecting response mechanism. In short, Murray and Ferenc learn to interact with each other through action upon this mechanism.

The dimension which may justify the label of therapy is that both Murray and Ferenc are enabled to learn. Just as the therapist and client are engaged in a joint enterprise to understand (i.e. to understand the client and the way in which he/she is able to relate to the world), so are the two protagonists in this chapter. It is clear from the way in which Murray writes, as well as the content of her chapter, that she has experienced the computer as a medium in which she has been enabled to learn about Ferenc and his way of seeing and understanding the world. And this kind of learning has been reciprocated by Ferenc himself, who has learned something of Murray.

Of course, computers could be used to train the child with autism to perform certain tasks. But that is not what occurs in the case of Ferenc. The point of all this for the teacher is that the computer offers choice and the potential to synthesise education and therapy. Precisely because of its asocial possibilities it becomes an ideal vehicle for learning together and learning about each other. This is not to deny its usefulness as a way of training. Training is often an essential precursor to education and as such needs to be valued. What Murray offers in her chapter is a notion of using computers which goes beyond the apparent useful functions of training in particular skills and knowledge and enters an altogether richer domain.

Using the Child’s Interests

Just as we saw above, that there can be a paradox in an asocial medium being used ultimately for social learning, there is a paradox in teaching individuals with autism in that only when we truly enter their focus of interest, can they begin to enter ours. The author offers a convincing argument for why this is so, and a moving account of how it was achieved with Ferenc through the use of computers. The author also deals with the worries voiced by many teachers and carers, with respect to the use of computers with people with autism, that the individual will become increasingly obsessive and less interested in people. In doing so, she raises another paradox: that engaging with the child in an obsessive interest can make it less obsessive (in that it can make the child more open to ‘advice’ and modification of otherwise obsessive routines), and that an asocial medium can be used to mediate a social relationship. The particular reasons for the attraction of computers for people with autism are expressed eloquently in the chapter, as are the particular benefits of using computers as the joint focus of attention in teaching.

Reference

Powell, S.D. and Jordan, R.R. (1996) ‘Education, therapy and autism: a special case?’ in Proceedings of the International Conference — ‘Therapeutic Intervention in Autism: Perspectives from Research and Practice.’ Durham University, published by the Autism Research Unit, University of Sunderland.

↑ Back to top