Eric Schopler, founder of Divison TEACCH, dies at 79
Eric Schopler, the UNC-Chapel Hill psychologist who recognized autism as a brain disorder and rejected the notion of poor parenting causing autism, died on July 7th. He was 79 years old, as reported in today’s News & Observer (NC). Dr. Schopler’s research led to the development of TEACCH, Treatment and Education of Autistic and Related Communication-Handicapped Children.
Dr. Schopler’s German parents were forced to flee Hitler in the 1930s and he was, a family and friends noted, always deeply motivated by a sense of injustice. Writes the News & Observer:
He saw stark unfairness while training in psychology at the University of Chicago with the Freudian psychoanalyst Bruno Bettelheim, who compared the parents of autistic children to concentration camp guards.
But while working with those families, Schopler saw instead caring people who frequently raised normal children in the same household. As a young professor at UNC-Chapel Hill, he and child psychiatrist Richard Reichler started a research project that described autism as a brain disorder, not an emotional problem, and developed strategies to help parents accommodate their child’s disabilities.
A book detailing a diagnostic strategy for autistic adolescents and adults that Dr. Schopler recently finished will be published soon.
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POSTED IN: History, Psychology, Stereotypes, Treatment
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