Autism was officially "discovered" and described as a distinct condition in America in 1943 by Leo Kanner, a child psychiatrist at Johns Hopkins University. Kanner published a seminal paper describing a group of eleven children exhibiting unique behavioral characteristics, which he termed "early infantile autism" to emphasize their pronounced social and communicative challenges from a very young age. His work laid the foundation for the formal recognition and modern understanding of autism in the United States.
Before this time, individuals with autistic traits were often misdiagnosed with other conditions or misunderstood, as autism was not yet categorized as its own disorder. Kanner's research marked the turning point for recognizing autism as a distinct neurodevelopmental condition in America.
