What is asperger's anyway

[Gibsie]

"A person with Asperger's will try to put off revising even if he has nothing much better to do then. He'll do one thing, then another, then another, trying to do anything interesting at all, because it's extremely hard for him to bring himself to do the uninteresting stuff."

And well, playing Civ 4 for a few hours on the days before an exam, then going on the net to post at silly internet forums? Watching Australian soap Neighbours every day if possible? Sounds like it to me...

[General Ludd]

Originally posted by Jon Miller
How about running into walls, is that a sign of Aspergers?

Yes, actually.

[Dis]

But surely people can get better at these things. I'm much better socially than I was in my childhood and teenage years. But I still have a long way to go before I could even get in the normal range.

[Darius871]

Originally posted by Solver
Darius: psychologists should all go to jail anyway .

In fairness, I was under the impression that autism spectrum disorders are the neurologist's prerogative, as they are almost entirely explained by structural factors (white matter interconnectivity especially). If I'd have been diagnosed by some neo-Freudian fairy fruitcake it wouldn't mean **** to me.

Originally posted by Solver
I am aware of the formal medical definitions of Asperger's and studies related to the syndrome, but I'd be very interested, still, to see how a doctor can really diagnose this. Keeping in mind that diagnosis requires extremely good knowledge of the person in question, including their childhood behaviour.

I don't recall the details as it was about six years ago, but it did involve a personal interview with a checklist and standardized scoring system. The symptoms are most pronounced in childhood so direct observation of social skills and behavior is most effective then, but in the case of older subjects (like myself) interviewing parents and a conducting a thorough examination of past therapists' notes, school documents, etc. was more than enough to get an accurate picture of childhood symptoms.

With borderline cases diagnoses are by no means ironclad, but when a subject clearly has to perform every single nonverbal communication - the dozens of muscular contractions that produce facial expressions, mannerisms, voice intonation, everything - from rote memory rather than instinct, he/she displays a number of subtle tics due to the anxiety involved in conducting so many calculations simultaneously, and his/her eyes are permanently fixated on the wall six inches to the left or right of your face, it's pretty damn cut and dry. I only had to talk to the guy for a few minutes before it was painfully obvious.

[Solver]

You may be talking about the Simon Bar-Cohen test, that checklist interview.

Asperger's isn't the same as autism, though. "Regular" autism will have more severe social inabilities, and less other characteristics. This:

subject clearly has to perform every single nonverbal communication - the dozens of muscular contractions that produce facial expressions, mannerisms, voice intonation, everything - from rote memory rather than instinct and his/her eyes are permanently fixated on the wall six inches to the left or right of your face

is very severe, and pretty damn sure indicates autism. However, you can't really say if it's Asperger's based on that. Asperger's is a more complicated thing, characterized by all those intellectual peculiarities, interests, weird quirks.

but in the case of older subjects (like myself) interviewing parents and a conducting a thorough examination of past therapists' notes, school documents, etc. was more than enough to get an accurate picture of childhood symptoms.

I would guess that depends on your country. Interviewing the parents is one thing, but over here, you'd be hard-pressed to find any other really appropriate sources, other than parents. School documents, for example, will indicate just basic performance, but not the social behaviour (unless criminal or very destructive) or peculiarities such as performing poorly because of a lack of interest that couldn't be overcome by teachers.

[Jon Miller]

I still think that Aspergers is something that many people could fall under if you look just at symptoms, while a smaller number have the intrinsic brain differences...

That brain is a complicated Organ, many different things can cause similiar symptoms. To say that the symptoms are the thing, might be valid, but in that case you might as well replace aspergers with geek.

Jon Miller

[Solver]

Only I haven't seen anyone suggest what brain differences exactly constitue Asperger's. It's a hard beast to define, much harder than, say, schizophrenia.

[Elok]

Clinically, a disorder only exists as a disorder if it's causing difficulties to the patient or others. Which is not to say some of you mightn't be aspies, but if you've gone through life without noticing it, a diagnosis is not only improbable but irrelevant. Just call yourselves dorks and get on with it. If you're fussy about food, act unfriendly, get along poorly with all your neighbors, can't win a fight, and have terrible manners, you might be an aspie...or you might just be French. Whatever.

The symptoms of AS are vague because of the remarkable diversity of people with the disorder. It's fairly distinctive and different from plain geekiness to a trained eye.

[Dis]

so what if they diagnose you with it? Is it treatable? Or just treatable with nasty drugs?

[General Ludd]

Originally posted by Solver
Only I haven't seen anyone suggest what brain differences exactly constitue Asperger's. It's a hard beast to define, much harder than, say, schizophrenia.

It's something in the frontal lobe, from what I rememer reading. Apparently it can also be heriditary.

[Darius871]

Originally posted by Solver
Asperger's isn't the same as autism, though. "Regular" autism will have more severe social inabilities, and less other characteristics. This:

subject clearly has to perform every single nonverbal communication - the dozens of muscular contractions that produce facial expressions, mannerisms, voice intonation, everything - from rote memory rather than instinct and his/her eyes are permanently fixated on the wall six inches to the left or right of your face

is very severe, and pretty damn sure indicates autism.

Autism is not monolithic, which is precisely why it is often called Autism Spectrum Disorder according to the abnormal psych textbook sitting in my lap. From everything I've read I got the impression Asperger's Syndrome simply lies at a certain point on that spectrum, where somebody with a very mild autism has good enough memory, intellect, and processing speed to feign normality reasonably well. That is, well enough to lead a productive life in most cases, but not enough to be any more social than the necessities of life require.

However, their mild autistic tendencies can still manifest themselves in the "intellectual peculiarities, interests, weird quirks" you refer to. For instance, while a severe autistic savant might have a narrow interest in memorizing baseball card stats, someone in the AS segment of the spectrum might focus that energy on Swedish history, computer science, or astrophysics.

Originally posted by Solver
I would guess that depends on your country. Interviewing the parents is one thing, but over here, you'd be hard-pressed to find any other really appropriate sources, other than parents. School documents, for example, will indicate just basic performance, but not the social behaviour (unless criminal or very destructive) or peculiarities such as performing poorly because of a lack of interest that couldn't be overcome by teachers.

Yeah, the teachers at my school were particularly anal about documenting even the most innocuous behavior or quirks to be prepared for parent-teacher conferences. This varies not only from country to country, but county to county.

[Solver]

Yeah, autism is a spectrum disorder, there's just a part of that spectrum that is commonly referred to simply as "autism". Asperger's seems to have much milder social inabilities. On the other end of the spectrum, you have people who have very serious trouble communicating, on the Asperger's end, you have weird communication, as in somewhat strange language or body language, but nothing too severe really. And of course people with Asperger's tend to score high on the intellectual scale.

I would say that an Aspie is more likely to make his condition useful than an autistic savant. An autistic savant, as you say, may have an interest in baseball cards, which won't be too useful. An Aspie might have an intense narrow interest that he makes use of - programming (becomes a highly skilled programmer), airplanes (an engineer), etc. This part is my personal conclusion, though.

Yeah, the teachers at my school were particularly anal about documenting even the most innocuous behavior or quirks.

I really don't know whether to commend the school/teachers on good record-keeping, or condemn them for being too anal with regards to children. I just know that, for example, my records would show almost zero about my behaviour or personality. In fact, probably the only info, other than grades, that they contain is that I am horrible at all forms of visual arts.

[Darius871]

Originally posted by Solver
Yeah, autism is a spectrum disorder, there's just a part of that spectrum that is commonly referred to simply as "autism". Asperger's seems to have much milder social inabilities. On the other end of the spectrum, you have people who have very serious trouble communicating, on the Asperger's end, you have weird communication, as in somewhat strange language or body language, but nothing too severe really. And of course people with Asperger's tend to score high on the intellectual scale.

I would say that an Aspie is more likely to make his condition useful than an autistic savant. An autistic savant, as you say, may have an interest in baseball cards, which won't be too useful. An Aspie might have an intense narrow interest that he makes use of - programming (becomes a highly skilled programmer), airplanes (an engineer), etc. This part is my personal conclusion, though.

Oki, we're pretty much on the same page then. I thought you were drawing a sharper distinction earlier.

[Solver]

It's also interesting how Asperger's changes with age. Well, the ease of detecting it. Talk to a 7-year old with Asperger's, and you'll see in 5 minutes that there are subjects where he is as competent as a university student. You'll also immediately notice his strange communication. A 15-year old with Asperger's will probably be shunned by his classmates, but many kids are, so seeing him as an Aspie would take more effort. A 20-year old with Asperger's will have learned many of the social skills that he didn't develop naturally, and will only seem a little bit odd, unless you get to know him closer.

[Darius871]

Originally posted by General Ludd
It's something in the frontal lobe, from what I rememer reading. Apparently it can also be heriditary.

MRIs have also revealed white matter abnormalities throughout the cerebrum, which tends to support the theory that autism is the result of some neural constructs being better connected than others. For instance, in Charlie Babbitt the cortical areas where neurons fire while counting cards would be far more accessible to consciousness than the cortical areas where neurons fire during sustained eye contact.

Normal genetic sequences caused these grey matter constructs to be created, but abnormal genetic sequences created unusually abundant white matter connections for the former and unusually few for the latter. The theory explains narrow savant gifts, social or other deficiencies, and autism's high heritability all at once.