The more studies are conducted into questions of diagnosis, the stronger becomes the impression that difficulties in recognising the boundaries of autism are not solely a consequence of the subjective and elusive nature of the symptoms. Rather, it seems that we are dealing with a disorder that has no clear boundaries. Wing (1988) has argued that rather than thinking rigidly in terms of a discrete syndrome of autism, we should be aware that there is a continuum of autistic disorders. She regards social impairment as the core symptom of such disorders. Children with this social impairment are characterised by a triad of deficits in social recognition, social communication and social understanding. In each of these domains, a wide range of severity of impairment is recognised. In the sphere of social communication, for instance, the severely impaired child may make no effort to initiate communication at all; the more moderately impaired children may use language to achieve some end, such as obtaining an object; the mildest form of impairment corresponds to subtle difficulties in recognising the needs of conversational partners. Wing would regard a child as falling on the autistic continuum provided they showed this triad of social impairment, irrespective of other symptoms. However, she noted that impairments in other areas do tend to co-occur with the social triad, in particular repetitive and stereotyped activities, poor motor coordination and abnormal responses to sensory stimuli. As far as language is concerned, the child with the triad of social impairment will by definition be defective in the pragmatic aspects of language. In addition, problems with the more formal aspects of language (grammar, phonology) may be associated with the social impairments, but are not found in all cases.
FIVE: SEVEN SENTENCES
The many different forms of cultural expression and the increasingly frequent interlocking of the various cultural disciplines make it difficult to quantify employment in the cultural sector by statistical analysis alone.
Culture covers heritage, literature, the press, music, the performing arts, visual and audiovisual media and socio-cultural activities.
Nevertheless, recent studies suggest that in 1995 the number of jobs in the cultural sector in the fifteen countries of the EU was about 2.5 million.
These highly dynamic creative and service activities have many aspects that are central to European competitiveness.
Culture, and the various sectors of the cultural industry, is a major economic and social force in the European Union.
Some of them are fast-growing industries, such as the audiovisual media (where the 100 leading companies have a turnover of ECU 7 billion, rising by 15% in 1994 and 1995) and the music recording industry (where the ECU 8.8 billion turnover in 1995 was up by 9% on 1994 and three European groups control 40% of the world market).
If arts and crafts are included there are over three million jobs in the cultural and craft sectors, or a little over 2% of jobs in the Union.
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© 2002 Martin Paterson