ABSTRACT
The primary goals of the field of developmental disorders are to understand the biological basis of different syndromes and the mappings between the genetic cause, the abnormalities in brain development, and the cognitive and behavioural consequences or outcomes, including mental retardation, that are characteristic of the majority of individuals with specific disorders. This is a field that has made remarkably rapid progress in recent years and, because it is concerned with a theoretical integration of knowledge across all these levels of analysis-genetics, developmental neurobiology, cognitive science, and psychology-it is now taking its place within the broader enterprise of developmental cognitive neuroscience (Tager-Flusberg, 1999).
