Are you on the Autism Spectrum?

[logboy]

13.

 

a few years ago a psychologist wanted to diagnose that i had 'adult aspergers', but my doctor told him to get stuffed.

 

most of the potential symptoms i have are more (for me) about my long term suffering with depression and the isolation of being lost in my own thoughts about the causes / cures of it.

[Silent Member]

I did those other two as well.

Empathy 57

Systemizing 27

 

I hope y'all find that fascinating.

[Guest Iain C]

25, but I doubt anybody truly has the self-awareness to answer questions like these honestly or accurately.

[popiax]

Woaaah mang I'm on the cusp of the autism zone for all of these...
27 on the general one and then 42 for systemizing and 31 for empathy.
I keep having the "it depends" thing for a lot of the questions though.

[Salvatorin]

Let's just get that nasty word 'dysfunction' out of here because it's all relative. You might be perfect for the social dynamic of a small sami village rather than your workplace. Who knows! These surveys are asking you questions that are culturally relative, so they are really gauging 'how average of a british guy' are you or such. These aren't universal human qualities these are measuring, and you aren't a 'dysfunctional' human if you don't score in the average.

[goDel]

The funny thing might be that most people understand the questions in the sense which answer would add to the "autistic"-stack and which doesn't. They're pretty obvious, and so are the answers. But normal people can be really critical towards themselves and have a high score, even though in reality they're normal. (call it "true self-awareness, if you will. i'd argue there is none, btw. but that's another story)

And that's basically what baron-cohen said, I guess. Autistic people cannot have a low score - because they do not understand the principles behind the questions.

 

I can only think of those normal people with a high score as either being way too critical towards themselves, or they're in a pretty rough spot in their lives.

 

I bet most of you know damn well which answers give you more "autistic" points and which don't. Shame on you!! ;-p

[logakght]

lol autistic points...I actually believe this kind of tests are bullshit, cause like someone already said, there are so many factors involving those situations.

[Hoodie]

Let's just get that nasty word 'dysfunction' out of here because it's all relative. You might be perfect for the social dynamic of a small sami village rather than your workplace. Who knows! These surveys are asking you questions that are culturally relative, so they are really gauging 'how average of a british guy' are you or such. These aren't universal human qualities these are measuring, and you aren't a 'dysfunctional' human if you don't score in the average.

 

 

The funny thing might be that most people understand the questions in the sense which answer would add to the "autistic"-stack and which doesn't. They're pretty obvious, and so are the answers. But normal people can be really critical towards themselves and have a high score, even though in reality they're normal. (call it "true self-awareness, if you will. i'd argue there is none, btw. but that's another story)

And that's basically what baron-cohen said, I guess. Autistic people cannot have a low score - because they do not understand the principles behind the questions.

 

I can only think of those normal people with a high score as either being way too critical towards themselves, or they're in a pretty rough spot in their lives.

 

I bet most of you know damn well which answers give you more "autistic" points and which don't. Shame on you!! ;-p

 

both of these posts are very good and i agree with them! especially godel, well said. i wish i could've explained this as well as you did to avoid some confusion (and potential identity crises) earlier in the thread.

[vertsk8er419]

25

[YO303]

lol autistic points...I actually believe this kind of tests are bullshit, cause like someone already said, there are so many factors involving those situations.

 

Is it bad that my doctor used a similar test to diagnosed me? yuk

 

When i was 14 i had to take a similar test for a job .. at Mcdonalds.

 

I no longer have confidence in doctors to properly diagnosed me if they use these shitty tests.

[Hoodie]

from baron-cohen:

One new idea is to see the high-functioning autistic spectrum as a dimension of traits that runs right through the population. Using a metric of autistic traits called the Autism Spectrum Quotient (AQ), population studies have confirmed that these show an approximately normal distribution (Baron-Cohen et al, 2001c). This means that, rather than thinking of people with autism or AS as different to everyone else, we can see them on a continuum with everyone else.

 

The E-S theory recognises that different people show different size discrepancies between E (empathising) and S (systemising). Whilst people with autism and AS show a large discrepancy between these (S>>E), there are others who show smaller discrepancies in the same direction (S>E), a profile that is more common among males and prompting the theory that autism may be no more than an extreme of the male brain. Equally, some individuals show a discrepancy in the opposite direction (E>S), a profile more common among females, and there are even individuals who show the mirror image of autism (E>>S). Both the E-S theory and the AQ suggest that society needs to be tolerant of different cognitive styles, rather than expecting everyone to conform to a single (average) profile. Acknowledging that there is no single profile that counts as ‘normal’ may help change attitudes towards those who show minority profiles and help normalise autism spectrum conditions, again reducing the risk of making people with highfunctioning autism and AS feel marginalised.

here are a couple of papers that use the autism spectrum quotient, for those interested (there are more but i couldn't find them on anything but those shitty journal article websites):

 

http://geniiz.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/16.pdf

http://docs.autismresearchcentre.com/papers/2006_Golan_etal_Films.pdf

Edited January 27, 2013 by Hoodie

[eugene]

The funny thing might be that most people understand the questions in the sense which answer would add to the "autistic"-stack and which doesn't. They're pretty obvious, and so are the answers. But normal people can be really critical towards themselves and have a high score, even though in reality they're normal. (call it "true self-awareness, if you will. i'd argue there is none, btw. but that's another story)

And that's basically what baron-cohen said, I guess. Autistic people cannot have a low score - because they do not understand the principles behind the questions.

 

I can only think of those normal people with a high score as either being way too critical towards themselves, or they're in a pretty rough spot in their lives.

 

I bet most of you know damn well which answers give you more "autistic" points and which don't. Shame on you!! ;-p

if they don't understand the principle they might not be able to answer the questions in a way that will indicate autism, i think. an autistic person might think that he understands facial expressions and undertones but in reality he doesn't..so how can this test test for autism properly ?

[goDel]

 

The funny thing might be that most people understand the questions in the sense which answer would add to the "autistic"-stack and which doesn't. They're pretty obvious, and so are the answers. But normal people can be really critical towards themselves and have a high score, even though in reality they're normal. (call it "true self-awareness, if you will. i'd argue there is none, btw. but that's another story)

And that's basically what baron-cohen said, I guess. Autistic people cannot have a low score - because they do not understand the principles behind the questions.

 

I can only think of those normal people with a high score as either being way too critical towards themselves, or they're in a pretty rough spot in their lives.

 

I bet most of you know damn well which answers give you more "autistic" points and which don't. Shame on you!! ;-p

if they don't understand the principle they might not be able to answer the questions in a way that will indicate autism, i think. an autistic person might think that he understands facial expressions and undertones but in reality he doesn't..so how can this test test for autism properly ?

 

Well, one obvious answer is that it's about all the questions together. Instead of a single question (about facial expressions). Anyone could give an honest/sincere answer to one or more answers which he/she shouldn't - given that the "real" outcome is already known (eg. a non-autistic person who answers he/she can't read facial expressions (perhaps because he/she believes everyone is playing a game of poker!?).

 

By having more questions, the idea is these fallacies will become insignificant.

Edited January 27, 2013 by goDel

[eugene]

it's not just that single question, there are similar self-report questions that an autistic person can answer in a "normal" way (in my understanding), see: 11, 36, 38, 44, 45, 46, maybe 47. i just don't understand the point of including such questions.

[goDel]

I'm not sure what you mean with "self report questions".( Because all of them are? And not just the ones you picked?) And besides the semantics, the principle stays the same: by having more questions, the outcome will be less influenced by "mistakes". Another example of fallacies might be someone who didn't read a question properly and ignored a negation. Ever wondered how many people fast read, past a "not" inside a sentence? You'd be amazed.

[YO303]

Is it fair that when people take this test they might answer a question knowing what the outcome will be, intentionally steering the result in one direction.

[eugene]

I'm not sure what you mean with "self report questions".( Because all of them are? And not just the ones you picked?) And besides the semantics, the principle stays the same: by having more questions, the outcome will be less influenced by "mistakes". Another example of fallacies might be someone who didn't read a question properly and ignored a negation. Ever wondered how many people fast read, past a "not" inside a sentence? You'd be amazed.

yeah, forget the self report part.

the questions i picked pretty much invite mistakes given this thread's definition of autism and the idea of being not aware of own autism, don't you agree ?

Edited January 27, 2013 by eugene

[goDel]

I'm not sure wether Baron-Cohen's point is clear, but the point he was trying to make, is that this test isn't perfect (which is pretty much a given for any test) in the sense that even "normal" people could get a high score. The only thing which this test does well, according to Baron-Cohen, is distinguishing the "autists" from the "normals" in the sense that "autists" in general don't get scores below 30. Of course there's always the monkey-out (give a million monkeys a typewriter and one of them might type the text of Hamlet - by coincidence).

 

So in a way, if you're able to "honestly" get your score below 30, you're safe. And "honestly" meaning you can imagine yourself in situations agreeing with the outcome which does not stack in the "autistic"-spectrum. Even though you might "currently" feel different. (Everyone can feel socially awkward. It's a normal feeling...)

[keltoi]

14

[eugene]

I'm not sure wether Baron-Cohen's point is clear, but the point he was trying to make, is that this test isn't perfect (which is pretty much a given for any test) in the sense that even "normal" people could get a high score. The only thing which this test does well, according to Baron-Cohen, is distinguishing the "autists" from the "normals" in the sense that "autists" in general don't get scores below 30. Of course there's always the monkey-out (give a million monkeys a typewriter and one of them might type the text of Hamlet - by coincidence).

 

So in a way, if you're able to "honestly" get your score below 30, you're safe. And "honestly" meaning you can imagine yourself in situations agreeing with the outcome which does not stack in the "autistic"-spectrum. Even though you might "currently" feel different. (Everyone can feel socially awkward. It's a normal feeling...)

i understand that, i just don't understand the point of inclusion of some questions which are problematic to begin with, the mere number of questions doesn't add validity obviously.

 

Is it fair that when people take this test they might answer a question knowing what the outcome will be, intentionally steering the result in one direction.

it can be a problem, but in this case i don't think there's a reason to suspect such artificial skewing of the answers. it's anonymous and people are interested in accurate results after all. though it could be that there's something more subconscious at play when doing such tests. Edited January 27, 2013 by eugene

[goDel]

 

I'm not sure wether Baron-Cohen's point is clear, but the point he was trying to make, is that this test isn't perfect (which is pretty much a given for any test) in the sense that even "normal" people could get a high score. The only thing which this test does well, according to Baron-Cohen, is distinguishing the "autists" from the "normals" in the sense that "autists" in general don't get scores below 30. Of course there's always the monkey-out (give a million monkeys a typewriter and one of them might type the text of Hamlet - by coincidence).

 

So in a way, if you're able to "honestly" get your score below 30, you're safe. And "honestly" meaning you can imagine yourself in situations agreeing with the outcome which does not stack in the "autistic"-spectrum. Even though you might "currently" feel different. (Everyone can feel socially awkward. It's a normal feeling...)

i understand that, i just don't understand the point of inclusion of some questions which are problematic to begin with, the mere number of questions doesn't add validity obviously.

 

It's the research behind the test which validate the (number of) questions. I'm not saying there aren't "problematic questions" or not. The only point is that for tests like these, there's always research validating the outcomes. Because like you and other mentioned, people, in other words, are "weird" creatures. They make mistakes. They can lie to others. They can lie to themselves. They can be moody. ... And there's a ton more which you could put here. So given these weird things, the point is there's an implied statistic relevance for this set of questions.

 

But I'm afraid I still don't understand your misunderstanding. Perhaps I'm autistic after all. (Actually, I'm a monkey with a typewriter!! :D)

[Guest Aserinsky]

The funny thing might be that most people understand the questions in the sense which answer would add to the "autistic"-stack and which doesn't. They're pretty obvious, and so are the answers. But normal people can be really critical towards themselves and have a high score, even though in reality they're normal. (call it "true self-awareness, if you will. i'd argue there is none, btw. but that's another story)

And that's basically what baron-cohen said, I guess. Autistic people cannot have a low score - because they do not understand the principles behind the questions.

 

I can only think of those normal people with a high score as either being way too critical towards themselves, or they're in a pretty rough spot in their lives.

 

I bet most of you know damn well which answers give you more "autistic" points and which don't. Shame on you!! ;-p

 

The questionnaire in itself though does have questions designed to differentiate between self conscious people and the truly autistic. For example:

 

"I find it difficult to work out people's intentions"

 

Now a self aware individual worried they might have a form of autism would say yes to this question, because they're almost trying to confirm a self diagnosis and know autistic people struggle with working out people's intentions. However, an autistic person wouldn't necessarily think this way; see when I was growing up, I always thought I was an expert on understanding people's intentions and how to respond to them. As one example, when I was young there was a child that I really did not like, so for two years I refused to talk to him or acknowledge his existence right in front of him, thinking this would make him leave me alone and ignore me. There was one period where he started mixing with my friendship group, so I made his huge master plan where I would shout at him threats, thinking that he would be scared that I got to the point where I was talking to him and back off. However when I did this (I had a script written down with drawings of the playground and the times to the second on which I would say this to him, no joke), I was extremely shocked and confused when he laughed it off and didn't do what I said. I thought I was 100% correct at the time and was under the assumption everyone thought exactly how I thought; because I would have reacted in that situation everyone else should have reacted in the same way.

 

Besides, I think a lot of people here are forgetting that even if you do have a diagnosis of ASD, it doesn't mean that your personality or life is suddenly going to change. The diagnosis is only there to provide you with ways of understanding your own thought process and how said thought process differs from other people. If you actually do have an ASD and have got this far without being referred to anywhere than congratulations, that means your social skills are high enough that you can actually function within society at a pretty reasonable level. If you did have an ASD, it's more than likely it would have been picked up a lot quicker (the first sign is normally a 'regression' of sorts at the beginning of infancy which quite a lot of parents are shocked to find out).

[eugene]

 

 

 

 

I'm not sure wether Baron-Cohen's point is clear, but the point he was trying to make, is that this test isn't perfect (which is pretty much a given for any test) in the sense that even "normal" people could get a high score. The only thing which this test does well, according to Baron-Cohen, is distinguishing the "autists" from the "normals" in the sense that "autists" in general don't get scores below 30. Of course there's always the monkey-out (give a million monkeys a typewriter and one of them might type the text of Hamlet - by coincidence).

So in a way, if you're able to "honestly" get your score below 30, you're safe. And "honestly" meaning you can imagine yourself in situations agreeing with the outcome which does not stack in the "autistic"-spectrum. Even though you might "currently" feel different. (Everyone can feel socially awkward. It's a normal feeling...)

i understand that, i just don't understand the point of inclusion of some questions which are problematic to begin with, the mere number of questions doesn't add validity obviously.

 

 

It's the research behind the test which validate the (number of) questions. I'm not saying there aren't "problematic questions" or not. The only point is that for tests like these, there's always research validating the outcomes. Because like you and other mentioned, people, in other words, are "weird" creatures. They make mistakes. They can lie to others. They can lie to themselves. They can be moody. ... And there's a ton more which you could put here. So given these weird things, the point is there's an implied statistic relevance for this set of questions.

 

But I'm afraid I still don't understand your misunderstanding. Perhaps I'm autistic after all. (Actually, I'm a monkey with a typewriter!! :D)

 

 

it's simple, could the questions like "I enjoy social occasions." (which gives you 1 point if you disagree) or "I am good a social chit-chat." (same) be answered normally (without giving them points) consistently by autistic persons, given their lack of awareness of normal social encounter and different view on humans ? if yes then why include such ?

 

here's the scoring key btw: http://www.docstoc.com/docs/112546833/AQ-Scoring-Key

Edited January 27, 2013 by eugene

[luke viia]

wow, that key really highlights what a shit test this was, huh? lol, thanks eugene!

[goDel]

I'd love to answer your questions, but at this point I'll be running in circles.

 

Why? Because of research, research, research.

 

....

Research

 

...

And as a consequence, an implied "because by the current definition, people scoring high on the AS generally don't give answers like in your example. And one might even argue, those aren't typical mistakes for people scoring high in the AS." And here you get to a point where everything may implode on itself. (What is AS? Is the researched AS the actual AS? Why? Why? Why?... to infinity and beyond)