In France people are still medically treated on the basis of the four humors.
No they’re not, that’s a bitter joke, because the truth is almost as horrifying – children with autism are treated with psychoanalysis.
In many countries, the standard way of treating autistic children is with behavioural therapy – stimulating and rewarding them to develop the skills they need to function in society – but France still puts its faith in psychoanalysis. And an increasing number of parents are now demanding change.
For autism campaigners, it is one of the most serious health scandals of our times.
How for decades France turned its back on the latest scientific thinking, and treated autism as a form of psychosis.
How, as a result, tens of thousands of children were misdiagnosed – or not diagnosed at all – and consigned to lives of misery.
And how, to this day, in its approach to autism, the French medical establishment continues to believe in the powers of psychiatry and psychoanalysis – long after the rest of the world has switched to alternative methods of treatment.
…
The blame – Fasquelle and autism associations argue – lies with a medical establishment that remains fixated with Freud.
“Today everyone knows that autism is a neuro-developmental problem. It is not a psychosis or mental disorder,” says Muhamed Sajidi, president of the association Conquer Autism.
“But in France it is the psychiatrists – heavily influenced by Freudian psychoanalysis – who remain in charge. And they have shut themselves off from all the changes in our knowledge of autism.”
…
Critics say this emphasis on psychoanalysis and relationships meant that autistic children were not spotted till far too late. And that, in turn, meant that their chances of effective treatment were sharply reduced.
Some 60% of autistic children in Sweden attend school, Sajidi says.
“Today only 20% of autistic children in France are in school, and often only part-time. The rest are either in psychiatric hospitals, or in medico-social centres, or living at home…”
Freud, Lacan, Deleuze and Guattari…the French seem to have a thing for deepities. What a mess.
Today only 20% of autistic children in France are in school, and often only part-time. The rest are either in psychiatric hospitals, or in medico-social centres, or living at home
That’s just messed up. And I can’t blame the government like I usually do. The medical professionals who are supposed to be providing officials, parents and policy makers with reliable information aren’t.
They thought that if the child was failing to communicate with the outside world, it was because of some trauma in the womb or in very early life.
Now I’m worried about how they treat abuse survivors. Can’t they distinguish between and abused child and one on the autism spectrum?
Ophelia, would you care to explain how Deleuze and Guattari have anything to do with how autism is treated in France? I’d really be fascinated to learn. Incidentally, what are your credentials for commenting on autism?
Oh, lookie. A real, live Obviously Offended By Some Perceived Slight To His Field (I’m right, aren’t I?) commenter who then asks—-it’s scarcely believable—-for Ophelia’s comment-on-autism-certification-pass.
Josh,
People have made the most amazing assumptions about my background or field. Someone even seemed to think that I was a psychoanalyst (he referred to “many apoplectic blog posts by members of the dwindling psychoanalytic community”) – although that someone expressed that misapprehension at a different website.
For the record, then, I’m not a psychoanalyst, nor do I have any special expertise on autism. But then, I’m not attempting to pass judgment on the rights or wrongs of how autism is treated in France. As Ophelia Benson apparently is, it is pertinent to ask what her credentials are.
In fact, it is *not* relevant to ask Ophelia her credentials.
Since the medical, psychiatric, psychological, and scientific communities in every other country that has a decent medical system has said using psychoanalysis to treat autism is, well, insane…Ophelia is well within her rights as an intelligent human being to comment on treatment of autistic children in France.
I’m pretty sure that “sticking with what the science says” doesn’t qualify as going out on a limb.
(Also, I really hate when people show up and ask why a blogger is qualified to comment instead of, oh, explaining what specifically they disagree with and why. It’s sort of like the tone argument, except dumber.)
Anyone who keeps up on current research knows autism is a neuro-developmental disorder. Corchesne recently published results of brain scans of siblings of autistic children that showed the changes in brain growth occur before 6 months. Autism is not caused by ‘refrigerator mothers’ or vaccines. Try a Pubmed search on autism.
My background is biochemistry, plus experience with an autistic child. The school attendence rates in France are a scandal. My child receives extra reading help, but is at grade level or above in other subjects.
Years ago I read Frederick Crews’ Follies of the Wise. It contains what certainly seemed to me to be some devastating criticism of Freud. For a while the skeptical journals (Skeptic and Skeptical Inquirer) were having fun taking turns at psychoanalysis. Iirc, Freud was elected the #1 Pseudoscientist of all time in a poll taken by (I think) Michael Shermer.
He was apparently correct on a few things, but what he did, was not scientific.
There’s nothing scientific about psycho-analysis. When I did my undergraduate degree in psychology, Freud was an important part of the history of early psychology and he’s credited with a few insights, but not credited with being scientific in the least.
I think it’s probably a bit harsh to castigate Freud for being unscientific, at least without acknowledging that medicine at the time was being dragged kicking and screaming towards the idea of even washing hands to prevent infection.
Sigmund Freud was a doctor more than he was a scientist, and this story (treatment of autism in France) and his (Freud’s) story both highlight just how slowly medical practice has been in coming to adopt science.
Freud studied medicine, philosophy and zoology at one of the foremost Universities – Vienna – in the world and went directly to the Vienna General Hospital in 1882, where Ignaz Semmelweis had pioneered the idea of washing hands to prevent infection, but this idea would not be accepted until Koch’s experiments in 1890.
They were primitive times, relative to now, and there’s still sloppy science that’s influential in medicine (e.g. Ancel Keys’ Seven Countries study; see recent journal articles by Uffe Ravnskov et al.)
I didn’t castigate Freud for what he did in the 19th century. Not sure why you thought otherwise as we’re discussing the use of psycho-analysis on autism in today’stime.. . More those who still act as if Freud’s of later’s psycho-analytic ideas are in way backed empirically. Which I take to be necessary for science.
I can only imagine the frustration experienced by parents of an autistic child in France. In addition to one of my own children, we are friends with several parents of autistic children (mine being very mild – Asperger). Autistic children, when given proper care, can function very well with other kids in school. In my oldest child’s high school band are several autistic children that function just fine and are simply known as being a bit weird, but are accepted as just another member of the band.
It is always sad to see how old concepts that are known to be wrong can persist, but, this exists in many areas of our lives. As one example, my daughter is very athletic, and I’m floored that many coaches still insist on stretching before practices or games when it has been known for at least a couple of decades that stretching weakens muscles and is responsible for a number of common athletic injuries. Another example is oil changes for your car every 3,000 miles which Consumer Reports debunked in the early 90s, yet still persists with many auto shops and many people to this day.
Just because doctors are more educated doesn’t mean they are any less susceptible than anyone else to assuming the information they are provided is accurate.
“would you care to explain how Deleuze and Guattari have anything to do with how autism is treated in France”
Lacan’s cheerleaders have kept psychoanalysis respectable in France far more so than in any other country. The use of psychoanalyse in France to “treat” autism could not be so prevalent without this.
That is how D+G have something to do with how autism is treated in France.
“what are your credentials for commenting on autism?”
I am professor of post-Lacanian autism studies at the ENS. Who are you?
OK I’m lying, but you get my point. I hope.
I read the whole of the BBC piece before looking at Ophelia’s comment on it and immediately thought of the “coincidence” that France is also so heavily associated with PoMo and post-structuralism. Seeing that Ophelia already brought up that aspect, I feel no need to, but given that she’s already been attacked for it, I might as well mention that she’s even less alone than the subsequent comments suggest.
I claim not to be a professor of post-Lacanian autism studies, but given my lack of qualifications in general, there are probably justifiable grounds to think that I am mistaken.
I’m not attempting to pass judgment on the rights or wrongs of how autism is treated in France. As Ophelia Benson apparently is, it is pertinent to ask what her credentials are.
No, it’s pertinent to ask what her evidence is. It’s pertinent to ask what her sources are. Her personal background is of minimal importance to evaluating whether her claims are correct or incorrect. Not zero importance, perhaps, but given all the more important things you didn’t ask about, I find the question irrelevant.
I can’t tell why anyone takes Freud seriously these days, including the academic discipline I studied in graduate school. Then again, I studied Lacan and thought he was nuts, too. (Perhaps Lacan’s writing lost something in translation to English, but he seemed to write an awful lot of pretentious, substanceless jargon built on a foundation of purest handwavium.)
What was particularly striking about that article was the total dismissive arrogance of the analyst quoted – it was so obvious that all the detractors of Freud and Lacan were fools, probably with unresolved complexes of some kind… Classic closed-loop thinking.
That is very discouraging; guess I assumed that socialized healthcare would lead to more evidence-based medicine. I was surprised by the way the article conflates psychiatry and psychoanalytic practice. Psychoanalysts might be psychiatrists, but most psychiatrists are not psychoanalysts. Or maybe they are in France – chilling thought. What treatment do they recommend for people who have schizophrenia? Try to help them resolve the “deep issues” underlying their psychosis? Horrifying thought.
Allen Esterson has sent me some helpful (and alarming) links. This is a very live subject in France, and it was totally under my radar. To be continued.
Psychoanalysis is just a bunch of knob-gags elevated to an epistemology. It has no more foundation than scientology or homeopathy.
And my qualifications for saying this is a psychology degree and Aspergers – and the good fortune to be born in a country where the Viennese Witchdoctor is largely consigned to the literature department.
dirigible,
You wrote that, “Lacan’s cheerleaders have kept psychoanalysis respectable in France far more so than in any other country. The use of psychoanalyse in France to “treat” autism could not be so prevalent without this. That is how D+G have something to do with how autism is treated in France.”
What pure ignorance. Deleuze and Guattari weren’t “Lacan’s cheerleaders” and they didn’t do anything to keep psychoanalysis respectable. No one familiar with them would write such rubbish.
FWIW, Argentina is also a bastion of psychoanalysis, FSM knows why, and I can testify that the correlation between psychoanalsysis and being “a hotbed of PoMo thinking” is found here as well. I’m told, however, that Argentine psychoanalysts usually don’t get their hands on autistic children. The province where I live recently passed a law explicitly banning psychoanalysis from the pool of psychological and medical strategies deemed suitable for the treatment of autistic disorders. The local psychoanalytical establishment were livid. They resorted to an argument that is probably very well-known to those battling other pseudoscientific practices: that of “freedom of choice” for the parents, who by this law would be “deprived of choosing what treatment they want for their autistic children”.
Interesting, Pablo, thanks! I don’t suppose there’s anything linkable on this in English?
Bad news: In general, a lot of different issues which might fall under the mental/developmental health label are diagnosed and treated differently across many countries. I don’t exactly keep up on this, but as recently as the 1980s, early ’90s, there was a differential between the US and UK where doctors in one country would diagnose and treat for schizophrenia, in the other they would diagnose and treat for depression.
Psychoanalysis for autism* is pretty stupid.
* What defines autism in France? Is it the same as in the US? Do they agree on the same elements for defining autism or the autistic spectrum? (Regardless, psychoanalysis (definitely) or any of its talk therapy and analysis derivatives are pretty useless here, unless the French mean something completely different by “autism”.
Further, it is not necessarily a good idea to listen to any autism advocacy group without knowing their background. Some of them are truly off the mark, the most obvious ones being the antivaxxers and friends.
And what about the very popular claim that one in one hundred children are born with autism? Where do these millions of people disappear to? Or does this ratio include people with could be maybe mild Asperger’s Syndrome-like indicators. I’m asking partly because some human conditions become “popular” and consequently overdiagnosed, like various types of ADD were (or are they still?).
And another autism advocacy off the mark item: facilitated communication. What a train wreck that was.
It’s not overly harsh at all. The man falsified his case histories.
The fact that he’s still being taken seriously, by anyone, is a measure of how easy it is for educated people to be taken in by what Crews and Ophelia call fashionable nonsense.
“No one familiar with them would write such rubbish.”
So it isn’t just about authority, then?
Interesting.