ABSTRACT
John1 was a very easy baby. He seldom cried and was happy with his own company. When he went to a play park with his older brother he avoided the company of the other children, preferring to run up and down the perimeter fence, up and down, up and down, steadfastly avoiding the gaze of anyone who looked his way. When he was not running up and down, he would jump up and down, up and down, flapping his arms in a tireless way for great lengths of time. He still does this wherever he is and also now jumps tirelessly on his trampoline. He has fixations for sameness and, for a period, would always take two toys out with him and always of the same colour – or it might change and then, for a prolonged period, they would always be of the same two preferred colours. If one became mislaid he would be inconsolable. Another would not do. He made no effort to relate to those around him unless he wanted something, and then he would often take a hand and move it to what he wanted. His mother once said, ‘I’m sure he can hear me, but it’s as though he just doesn’t understand’. He did, however, have ways of making his desires known, especially to his mother. At meal times, for example, he would eat exactly the same for each breakfast, day after day, and the same applied to lunch and tea. His diet was severely limited and, if at lunch time she put something on his plate that should have been for tea, he would not touch not only that item, but everything else on the plate – even though that same item could be eaten for tea. At Christmas he ate exactly the same as always for lunch, choosing to sit separately from everyone else and creating a boundaried area for his play. He was generally a happy boy, unless routines were changed and there were unexpected occurrences. Before his fourth birthday John had been diagnosed with classic autism (APA, 2000), manifesting the
key diagnostic features of significant social communication difficulties, narrow interests and repetitive actions, and language delay. Language delay is defined as not producing single words by the age of two, or
phrase speech by the age of three. In classic autism, IQ can be anywhere on the scale and, as he develops, it will become clearer where John’s lies. In contrast, an individual diagnosed with Asperger syndrome would share the first two key features but show no language delay and have at least average intelligence. For further, more detailed profiles of individuals with autistic spectrum conditions read Baron-Cohen (2008), Frith (2008), Notbohm (2005). In both autism and Asperger syndrome, aspects of learning and development are atypical. Before moving
on to look more closely at autism spectrum conditions (ASCs),2 a few salient points from Jarvis’s work on learning are highlighted here and returned to at the end of this chapter in light of the issues raised. In his early work, Jarvis defined learning as ‘the transformation of experience into knowledge, skills and attitudes’ (1987: 8). This then broadened to ‘the combination of processes throughout a lifetime whereby the whole person – body (genetic, physical and biological) and mind (knowledge, skills, attitudes, values, emotions, meanings, beliefs and senses) – experiences social situations, the content of which is then transformed cognitively, emotively or practically (or through any combination) and integrated into the person’s biography resulting in a continually changing (or more experienced) person (Jarvis, 2009: 25). In his current work Jarvis reconceptualises learning as ‘the way that beings respond to their wider environment’. Critically, he goes on to argue that, ‘all learning must be conscious but what is recognised is that the level of awareness of the situations in which learning takes place can differ and different levels of awareness might produce different learning outcomes’. Jarvis concludes that ‘learning is the processes whereby a being consciously experiences and responds to the wider environment’ (Unpublished paper). A key distinction that he makes in his elaboration of learning, based on the work of Tomasello (1999): is that between imitation and emulation. Imitation, he suggests, is not simply copying behaviour, but is an attempt to ‘copy the adult’s intentions and the methods by which these are fulfilled’, whereas emulation ‘does not require that the learner seeks to understand the intentions of the person being copied. … ’ (Jarvis, Unpublished paper – personal communication 2010). He concludes that, during the first three years of life, there are considerable changes in the brain and that this is the period when the social brain is built as a result of the infant’s involvement in culture. Three key elements of Jarvis’s work are of particular interest in relation to autism – first, learning as a
response to the wider environment; second, that learning must be conscious, but the level of consciousness can differ, leading to different learning outcomes; and third, the distinction between imitation and emulation, with the latter not requiring understanding of the intentions of the person copied. Implicitly and explicitly recognition is given to the importance in learning of the ‘social brain’ and involvement in culture.
