Special interests?

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K so I'm obviously not a female but this sure does seem the best place to ask this 'cause I really want female perspective on this.

Almost positive now that my STBEW is an Aspie. Pretty sure that a woman I just started getting to know recently is also Aspie. Neither of them seem to have special interests that are of an obvious nature. Read on this web site that "Their special interests may not be as conspicuous and intense as occurs with males." http://www.myaspergerschild.com/2010/09 ... rgers.html

Already know that one doesn't "have" to have a special interest to have AS so you don't have to remind me.

What I'm really fascinated by is the fact that both my wife and this other woman can monologue like the dickens given the chance, but when they do they both talk about people. People in their lives. That seems to be their special interest I guess.

Funny difference between the two. STBEW hardly ever talks at all. This girl I just met? Cripes! All it takes is breaking the ice and she's off a million miles an hour! But it's about the same sorts of things.

Anyway. What I'm wondering is (and I bet this has been asked a lot already), whether this might be a typical difference between male AS and females with AS.

What do the women here think?

All the material I have read points to women having special interests; however, they tend to be less obscure than men's. Instead of trainspotting, for example, they might become obsessed with classic literature or something. My special interests include fitness, copying words from dictionaries, reading any sort of reference books or brain/philosophical books, and listening to music. I can do those things for hours and hours at a time, over and over again. In fact, this summer, I literally copied every dictionary definition found under the letter 'K.' It took less than a month.

I would agree with that, based on personal experience. I've never had the personal relationship interests, though. When I do chat about other people, it's just keeping up with work small talk. I find it distasteful, but I don't want to withdraw completely from the social loop I guess.
My son definitely has much more extreme interests, and more of a single focus on what he enjoys. I think of them in blocks which lasted for a couple years each time. I've heard quite a bit on anime soundtracks recently .
I definitely could monologue someone's ear off, but I realize most people don't share my enthusiasm so I try to keep a lid on it.

I'm usually pretty quiet, and listen more than I speak, but there are times when I do 'monologue'. Not about people, but definitely about stuff I'm interested in, or wonder about. I've been told I should have been a teacher, because when I get going I seem to be determined to inform/educate my listener.

Interesting so far. Any other takers?

Normally I am verbally very quiet but get me on just the right special interest subject in the right situation and I can overwhelm people with information. However, my speech isn't usually up to it, so it's more often via text with me. I make an effort not to overwhelm because I've been told that it's an issue, and it's bad for me too. It's really my depth of looking into long term subtle patterns in interest fields that I'm told is really difficult for others to follow, even when they want to. Often they want only my useful results concisely (out of boredom), after asking a very general question (out of curiousity)...which was a confusing problem with family communication through my teens. Problem Q: What do you want for lunch? (I could spend forever pondering the apparently limitless options and not get what I wanted and seem rude doing it) Better Q: Would you like a PB &J or egg sandwich? I'm still that way. So one of the things I had to learn in therapy years ago was to rephrase really general questions that people asked me, according to the situation. I had to limit the options in order to give an answer or else I might stay silent thinking and appear rude...or deaf. But overgeneralizing and being too literal is an issue. So you could be asking an innocent question like "So, how was your day?" and setting yourself up for quite a spill of processing. "Did you have a good day?" would be a better phrasing, since it's a yes or no question. It's possible to answer simply and stop. That's ideal when you don't want to overwhelm somebody or don't want to be overwhelmed yourself.

I think females process social information more than males do. Women are expected to be able to "read" people better, but we usually have trouble with it, and being able to use our ability to process the social *patterns* of specific people over time can help tell us lots of general things about people we know that we couldn't read from their facial expressions, but are handy to know in a pinch. The patterns of familiar people are like the sound of a familiar engine. If you listen often enough you just know when the pattern of the sound changes when something is wrong, and that might give you a little bit of an edge when you are dealing with a person's patterns too.
Special interests with me are mostly related to archival arts, health, and psych subjects. If I actually list them at this point, I'll go on about them, lol.

I was thinking over your original post this morning...is this the typical difference? Maybe.
I've noticed a lot over the past year that people think I'm anxious when I'm simply socially confused trying to figure out people and their intentions, when they are difficult for me to read. But I'm making an effort at it. I can be "anxiously chatty" trying to figure a problem person out. I think the difference might be the sheer effort we put into understanding people might put them into the "special interest" catagory at times. People (and how they work) are definitely a fairly consistent interest, except when I'm shut down, and it does compare with the amount of effort I put into some of my other interests. My husband and best friend say my perspective is unique, like I don't look at people and relationships the same way everybody else does. More practical maybe. Pragmatic is the word an old friend used to use.

I didn't even realize that I had "special interests" because they are constantly changing. My obsessions last for a week, if that, and than fade away as quickly as they came. They usually involve psychology or religion, and typically have *something* to do with something going on in my personal life. So like, for example, I got curious about my mother's strange behavior, so I researched "people who think they know everything" and discovered that my mother most likely has Narcissistic Personality Disorder. I immediately became absolutely obsessed with this - and ate, breathed and slept Narcissism. I was having nightmares about it even, than after about a week it all suddenly vanished. I don't even want this particular one to vanish because I feel that it is important that I learn about it to heal from my past experiences, but it's still taking me quite a bit of effort to read anything about it. The interest is gone, even though it's important to me.

Anyway, my point is...my "special interests" are way less obvious than other's because they don't last very long. I do think that frequently my obsession of the week revolves around people that I know, if they do something "interesting" that fuels my fire.

My special interests are not so obvious.

My big one right now is my kids. Its a bit of a problem because I will ramble on and on about them at work. I'm teaching myself to shut up about it, no one cares.

A long time one I have had is evolution and primates. I live in Ohio. I learned it's REALLY not a good idea to talk about that one.

Atheism. Also not good to talk about, although 3 of the guys I work with are atheist so I'll talk with them a little bit.

Other ones that come and go are all arts and crafts related like sewing and crochet which are hard to discuss.

And oh yeh, Vera Bradley. I just bought another purse and matching wallet . In mocha rouge. I got the mailbag it's really nice with lots of pockets I can fit my kindle in there. I really want to get the e-reader cover for my kin... ****. I'm not even going to delete that. My point IS(and I think I just made it pretty well) that I may have an unhealthy obsession with vera bradley bags/totes/accessories you name it.

I think women have the interests but perhaps not as intense. More importantly women are said to be better at communication and at learning to "act" like an NT. That being said I think we figure out quicker NOT to talk about our interests. For instance I was totally obsessed with that TV show lost. Now I know a lot of people were, but I had a fairly unhealthy obsession where I would mark episodes on a calendar, rewatch them over and over, and I would go to web pages/forums etc and just sit there and refresh the page every 2 miuntes waiting for new content. I NEVER discussed the show with anyone. My husband could tell I was... having issues (I had a meltdown when the dvr skipped an episode and I got upset when I missed an episode because I was in the hospital... having a baby) but I barely even discussed it with him. I just sat and hit refresh while trying to look busy on my laptop.

My special interests are Orthodox Judaism and languages.

As a kid and even a little today, it was dog breeds. Everything from a breed's origins, uses, coat type an color, acceptable sizes in the show ring, personalities, etc. Today it's pretty much weather, especially bad weather. Supercell thunderstorms, hurricanes, derechos, lightning...I love to videotape bad thunderstorms.

Fairy tales (especially Hans Christian Andersen), Formula One and languages. Random mix, I know!

What languages are you interested in?

I have intense special interests.

The monologueing all the time about people is ackshuly a trait that I have commonly observed in NT females. I find that NTs monologue a lot, just as much as people with AS and just as one-sided about topics that the other person doesn't care about. Their monologues are also just as rambling and incoherent, and they also fail to pick up on the fact that other people don't care.

My special interest is very understandable considering I am an aspie.

I am extremely interested in human beings - behaviours, interactions, motivations, relationships, anatomy, the human brain, health and how it affects behaviour, reproduction, society, etc etc.
I believe it is due to the fact that I don't understand this stuff naturally, hence I am doubly motivated to learn as much about it as possible. I love to analyse people and work out what makes them tick. It is all such a puzzle to me! I used to love barbies as a girl (until my friend who was much younger than me finally confessed that she had grown out of that phase - oops!) and running through social interactions with them. I analyse myself a lot also as I can provide myself with the most insight.

I have heard/read that many female aspies tend to study things like psychology, and the helping industries. I have a degree in Cognitive Science and am a Life Coach.

Because many NTs enjoy gossiping, it can work for me, because I use this as an opportunity to really understand someone's motives, thoughts, etc (my questions/comments are definitely a lot more "different" than others during conversations like these lol)

You're asking for "typical" interests - most females interests just might be considered more normal, or at least more normal for girls.

So I would not bother judging by what they are interested in, there is no point.

What you are looking for is the intensity of the interest that is the give away as to what the major interest/s are.

E.xamples:
- Reading - perfectly normal for a girl to like reading. However if they can read for 12 hours straight and forget to take breaks and eat - bingo, special interest.
- Animals - if they would and do sleep with the animal/s if you let them or spend as much spare time with them as you let them - another bingo.
- Music - again, if they get so distracted for so long that they forget to do normal things.

You will notice that all of those interests are thought of as normal for girls.
That is why the only true way to tell is to look at the intensity.