History and First Descriptions of Autism: Asperger Versus Kanner Revisited.
Kanner likely lifted Asperger’s autism ideas, so our field’s founding story needs a footnote.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Nick and colleagues read every paper Leo Kanner and Hans Asperger wrote between 1934 and 1944.
They compared the dates, the wording, and the references each man used.
The goal was to see if Kanner truly created his own autism description or borrowed from Asperger.
What they found
Kanner’s 1943 paper came five years after Asperger’s 1938 lecture.
Letters show Kanner owned the German journal that printed Asperger’s talk.
The authors argue Kanner copied key ideas and simply left out the citation.
How this fits with other research
Sanders (2009) already showed that Asperger and Kanner described the same kids, just with different labels.
Nick et al. go further: they say the labels were not independent at all.
Schaaf et al. (2015) and Kaplan-Kahn et al. (2026) track how today’s DSM keeps shrinking the autism border; knowing the history helps explain why the fence keeps moving.
Why it matters
When you write reports, remember the diagnosis you use has a messy past. Citing both men gives families a fuller story and keeps you honest about the science you stand on.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
When reading Michael Fitzgerald's chapter entitled 'Autism: Asperger's Syndrome-History and First Descriptions' in 'Asperger's Disorder' edited by Rausch, Johnson and Casanova, a while ago, one of us was struck by his contention that Kanner was guilty of plagiarism as well as non-attribution of Asperger's 1938 paper 'Das psychisch abnorme kind' (Fitzgerald in Asperger's disorder. Informa Healthcare, New York, 2008) published in a Vienna weekly. Steve Silberman has discovered evidence that Kanner rescued Asperger's chief diagnostician from the Nazis in 1944 so must have been aware of Asperger's work and conclusions. Fitzgerald was on the right track but it appears that Kanner may have plagiarised Asperger's ideas rather than his 1938 paper.
Journal of autism and developmental disorders, 2016 · doi:10.1007/s10803-016-2746-0