‘Birdwatching and baby-watching’: Niko and Elisabeth Tinbergen’s ethological approach to autism

Abstract

Biographers have largely dismissed Nikolaas ‘Niko’ Tinbergen’s late research into the causes and treatment of autism, describing it as a deviation from his previous work, influenced by his personal desires. They have pointed to the incoherence of Tinbergen’s assertions about best practices for treating autism, his lack of experience with children with autism, and his apparent embracing of psychogenic theories that the medical research community had largely abandoned. While these critiques have value, it is significant that Tinbergen himself saw his research as a logical extension of his seminal findings in the field of ethology, the science of animal behaviour. The reception of his theories, both positive and negative, was due less to their strengths or faults than to the fact that Tinbergen had inserted himself into a pre-existing and acrimonious debate in the autism research community. Debates about the relative role of environmental and hereditary factors in the aetiology of autism, and the implications of both for the efficacy of different treatments, had political and material significance for the success of parent organizations’ lobbying efforts and financial support for research programmes. Tinbergen’s approach was welcomed and even championed by a significant minority, who saw no problem with his ideas or methods.