Uta Frith, Ph.D.
M.I.N.D. Institute Distinguished Lecturer Series – February 8, 2006
Biographical Information
Uta Frith, Ph.D., is Professor in Cognitive Development at the University of London and Deputy Director of the
UCL Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience. Her research focuses on the developmental disorders of autism and
dyslexia. In both fields she has employed a unique approach that combines cognitive neuropsychological and
developmental methods to pioneer and contribute to the major theories explaining these disorders. She has proposed
and tested two of the main theories of autism, mindblindness and central coherence. Further, Frith has pioneered and
tested the phonological theory in longitudinal and cross-language studies in dyslexia and has shown that a
phonological deficit is persistent and universal. Her aim is to relate the underlying cognitive causes of these disorders
to specific brain systems. Frith studied experimental psychology at the Universität des Saarlandes, Saarbrücken, and
subsequently trained in clinical psychology at the University of London's Institute of Psychiatry. Since completing
her Ph.D. on autism in 1968, she has worked as a scientist funded by the Medical Research Council.
Presentation Abstracts
Autism and the Brain’s Theory of Mind (4 pm, technical lecture)
Impairments in social communication are the hallmark of autism spectrum disorders. Yet, the nature of these
impairments, which can range from severe to mild, is hard to define. Thus, many different aspects of social
interaction appear to be affected, resulting in a great deal of heterogeneity in the clinical picture. These aspects
include poor emotion processing, poor imitation, poor verbal and non-verbal communication, poor face processing,
poor gaze control, and poor language comprehension. One thread that runs through these impairments is what has
been termed “mindblindness” or “lack of theory of mind”. By this is meant the ability to attribute mental states to
other people, or mentalizing for short. Mentalizing is not an intangible and highly sophisticated conscious process.
Instead it is a cognitive capacity that is automatically triggered by specific stimuli, such as the movement of other
agents, the orientation of eye gaze, or the form and content of speech. Mentalizing has probably evolved from the
ability to understand others’ actions and intentions and the necessity to react quickly to conspecifics and other
creatures, who could be predators or prey. This mechanism has an identifiable basis in the brain and develops rapidly
in early childhood. It enables human beings to read each other’s minds - in a manner of speaking, and to predict
remarkably well what others are going to do next. Behavioural studies over the last twenty years have shown that
mentalizing is severely delayed or absent in individuals with autism spectrum disorders. This cognitive deficit may
explain a number of their social impairments, such as persistent social naivety. Brain imaging studies have shown that
in high-functioning individuals with autism spectrum disorders the brain’s mentalizing system shows reduced
activation and weaker connection between its components.
How Cognitive Theories Can Help Us Explain Autism (6 pm, community-interest lecture)
Should autism researchers focus solely on identifying the ultimate biological causes of autism? Researchers must
also work towards understanding what kind of thing autism is. What does it mean for an individual to have autistic
disorder? Knowing the causes of the disorder cannot answer this question. We will only understand what autism is
when we look at a whole causal chain of step-by-step explanations. This causal chain needs to be built by connecting
biology and behaviour. The middle ground between biology and behaviour is cognition. This middle ground helps us
to develop theories that explain signs and symptoms of autism by rigorously tested experiments, and thus to build
vital links in the long chain of causes. Three cognitive theories are currently trying to explain the social and nonsocial features of autism, the difficulties and strengths. One proposal is that individuals with autism suffer from
executive dysfunction, which might explain their rigidity and repetitive behaviour patterns, as well as many of their
practical difficulties in everyday life. Another proposal, aimed at explaining the typically uneven profile of
intellectual functioning and the phenomenon of savant skills, is that of a detail-focussed processing style. This is often
referred to as “weak central coherence”. A third theory is targeted at the social and communication impairments and
is often referred to as “mindblindness”. I will suggest that these proposals are complementary rather than
contradictory, and that they help us to refine the phenotype of autism so that it has a better chance to be mapped to the
genotype.