in his 1943 paper that first identified autism, leo kanner called attention to what appeared to him as a lack of warmth among the fathers and mothers of autistic children. in a 1949 paper, kanner suggested autism may be related to a "genuine lack of maternal warmth", noted that fathers rarely stepped down to indulge in children's play, and observed that children were exposed from "the beginning to parental coldness, obsessiveness, and a mechanical type of attention to material needs only... they were left neatly in refrigerators which did not defrost. their withdrawal seems to be an act of turning away from such a situation to seek comfort in solitude." in a 1960 interview, kanner bluntly described parents of autistic children as "just happening to defrost enough to produce a child."