Psychological VS Neurological Aspergers Syndrome/ASD

Post Reply New Topic

There are many reports of people "growing out" of aspergers syndrome when they reach adulthood. This leads me to believe that some people diagnosed with aspergers don't have a neurological problem but rather a psychological problem.

I'm not saying that everyone with aspergers can just "get over it". But with reports that in some people their symptoms all but dissapear in adulthood makes me theorize that some people with ASD can in fact "get over it" by proactively training themselves in socializing or working with a therapist etc. While there are others who can't get over it no matter what but some symtoms can be lessened.

I have a friend who has severe depression. He has no social life right now with littel interest in people and could probably fit the criteria for an ASD. It's just that he was depressed in his mid teens. If he was acting like this during childhood he would probably be diagnosed with an asd co-morbid with depression.

What do you guy's think? Is there people who meet all of the criteria for Aspergers that only have it because of something psychological that happened in there life ?(intense bullying, parental abuse, divorce, death of a loved one, etc).

Neuro-imaging techniques or genetic analysis are not widely used in the diagnoses of ASD currently so I don't think that this is an unreasonable conjecture.

It could be that they just learned a few social rules and that they just adapt well. That's my opinion, anyway.

It would be interesting if that was true, though.

No I don't think Aspergers comes from bad life events, PTSD can come out of that sort of thing or even worsened depression, anxiety or worsening of any issue that person might have but not ASD. I think its possible people have been misdiagnosed with ASD, Also some learn to fake it and come of neurotypical for the most part though I hear that is exhausting. But yeah I don't think if one legitimately has an ASD they are going to 'grow out of it.' and develop typical neurology.

I just want to clarify what I'm trying to get at in this thread.

The brain is plastic so to speak and can be altered during development. It is not unreasonable to think that certain negative life events or toxins could alter it during childhood or even during the teens that makes a person have ASD behaviours or even full blown ASD. I'm saying individuals like these can probably train themselves and alter their brains if they work hard enough.
For others with ASD though their neurological differences are so entrenched that it is impossible to change it enough to "cure" them so to speak(changes to the brain that happen during the womb or infancy).

I disagree. Just because one grows out of it doesn't make it psychological. In fact, I think growing out of it makes it more likely to be neurological since most psychological disorders cannot even be diagnosed until one's early adulthood, right about the time when most people who outgrow ASD lose their symptoms. It's a pervasive developmental disability; at some point, normal development might kick in to a greater or lesser extent. I believe this is preprogrammed in one's genetic code. By age 17-20, many who had a neurological disability as kids no longer have one. 17-20 is key, though I'm hoping that 26-30 can be a milestone in my case since my developmental clock seems to still be ticking.

I grew out of most of my ASD in spite of circumstances and environment conspiring to create the most inhospitable environment imaginable, including forced social isolation. But I clearly had very autistic symptoms as a child, including stims, spinning in circles, and a verbal language delay. I still grew out of most of it and became quite functional in some areas.

To me, it feels like there is a clock ticking out of my control that reveals new areas of development on its own timing without my participation. This seems a lot more like outgrowing a neurological impairment than overcoming something psychological.

By the way, it makes perfect sense. Autism is caused by over-wiring in certain areas of the brain and lack of connectivity between other parts. Over time, someone might have it in their genetic code to create new wiring between the underwired parts, but leaving the overwired parts the same. Anecdotally, this has happened in my case. My obsessions have not changed, but other things have. For example, in social situations, my response used to be very delayed. Someone would say "good morning!" and I would have to think for about 10 seconds to process it. In the past 2 years, this delay has disappeared, so now with few exceptions, my response time to social stimuli is automatic like an NT's. This indicates that, without my participation, parts of my brain that were underwired developed new connections.

Also, in the past six months, I suddenly have vast amounts of self-awareness appear out of nowhere while, previously, I had a textbook case of alexithymia. These things indicate slow neurological changes according to some predetermined clock, not anything I'm doing. I think some who are in a similar position are quite deluded and self-congratulatory, but I'm 100% honest about this. I honestly think my breakthroughs in development beginning at age 6 (went from barely verbal to hyper verbal/NLD) and age 10 (went from not reading to reading at a 10th grade level overnight) and 16 (huge jump in processing speed) to 22 (huge jump in social skills) to 26 (huge jump in self-awareness) were due strictly to predetermined neurological changes.

In the case of Autism (including Aspergers), it appears that portions of the brain contain significantly more neurons than is normal. These neurons form and move into place in the fetal brain (I think in the second trimester), not because of anything that happens after birth. There are also reports of less white matter, i.e. myelinated neurons linking different parts of the brain.

In other words, it certainly appears probable that the roots of Autism and Aspergers are to be found in neuroembryology rather than in what happens after birth.

That said, I don't think that this is absolutely conclusive, but it certainly appears to be likely. Research is certainly continuing in this area.

Although my traits and behaviours don't stand out as much now that I'm getting older, I don't say I have "grown out" of it, as I've just learned good coping skills.

Or simply a different clock. People attribute too much to the environment. If people grow out of autism, it is likely they have a gene telling them to do so. If people don't grow out of autism, it's likely that they don't.

There are people who grow up in wars and famines and who are sexually abused in the worst ways possible who still grow up to be fairly functional adults. Thus, I believe that environmental influences are vastly overestimated in the majority of cases involving mental disabilities.

I had a form of autism much more severe than Asperger's when I was a kid and the worst home environment possible for learning to grow out of it (a combination of too isolating, too easy, and no help learning anything) and still grew out of most of it not due to anything I did but due to a predetermined genetic sequence.

OCD looks little like asperger. However if you have an obsession that you wake up with and think about all day that is Asperger. I remeber being obsessed with one game and even when I wa sick and did not play the game I still could not stop thinking about it. This could only be neurological.

I don't think people really can grow out of ASD. ASD is a neuro-developmental disorder. The people who don't meet criteria anymore still have the ASD neurology they've just compensated enough that they no longer have a severe impairment in social interaction or repetitive behaviours impairing them. The compensation usually depends on characteristics that are a combo of genes and environment like most things are in life, namely intelligence, talent ,confidence, tenacity ect.

The person most likely still has neurological signs. Tyrion, I hope you don't mind if I use you as an example. You've been really successful and perhaps won't meet criteria for ASD. Nevertheless you mentioned in another thread that you still have motor skills problems and sensory issues. Also that you had to think consciously and use tapes in order to have normal prosody.

Last edited by daydreamer84 on 22 Apr 2013, 12:47 pm, edited 1 time in total.

The symptoms of Asperger's have a lot to do that the development in some areas of the brain is "delayed", so it's understandable that some outgrow that.

I believe that ASD is a neuropsychiatric disoder. So something on the edge between neurology and psychiatry if you will and that both are necessery that someone will "develop" ASD.

I respectfully disagree with the OP, through I do see where he's coming from.

ASDs, which are commonly DXed by way of "symptoms", appear to be related to neurological differences in several areas, the full list of which is far beyond the scope of this post.

I also don't think it's just a coincidence that the "outgrowing" often takes place around the age of majority, and particularly in those who have transitioned to a new enviroment (military, school, work, etc.). It's entirely possible, and I think probable, that it's the change to a more tolerant and/or more demanding enviroment causes a change in social interaction.

As far as I know, one of the most important criteria to diagnose AS (or any other neurological disorder) is the lack or psychological trauma, because the consequences of trauma can be confused with AS.

I outgrew many autistic symptoms during puberty in just a half year to a year and nothing changed in my environment at that time. I strongly believe it was due to the neurological changes during puberty. Interestingly, nearly at the same time I started to develope my mood symptoms.

Except I've been busy with school for approximately a month, and I checked a recording yesterday only to find that my prosody regressed almost completely, so yeah. It was good though for awhile. hahaha. So I likely do meet the full DSM 5 criteria again.

I think one can theoretically grow out of ASD; however, that doesn't make it psychological. In fact, I believe that most so-called psychological disorders are neurological anyway. Psychology is mostly a quack science that will be displaced by neuroscience in the next few decades. The idea of a differences between people being based largely on environmental factors is simply capitalist/conservative ideology, not science. Almost everything--including IQ and mental disorders--is genetic and chemical.

That's a good point. Our actions and thinking reflect the structures of our brains.