Since its introduction by E. Bleuler in 1911 the so-called ‘basic symptom’ autism has often been considered cardinally important within schizophrenic symptomatology. A lack of precise definition and hence of reliability, however, has eroded the former importance of this term, which cannot be found in modern diagnostic systems. Using a specific text-analytical method, we evaluated all accessible publications on schizophrenic autism, focusing on the descriptive-empirical approach. The entire material was then summed up in five essential points, providing a possibly more reliable (nomothetic) explication of the complex term of autism.