Are there more female Aspies than people believe?

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I've heard 80% of Aspies are male, but that sounds absurd to me. Maybe they're not diagnosed as often?

I heard that 3 out of 4 are male. Females have an XX chromosome and males have an XY chromosome. The female X chromosome has extra information that better protects them from the problem. There are many syndromes and genetic diseases that work that way.

I think that there are more female aspies, than people realize. I think it's more along the lines of 60% male and 40% female. That's what I've noticed, here.

I've also read that we mask and mimic better, and that (at least in the 60's and 70's, when I grew up), no one paid any attention to a smart, quiet, well-mannered girl. That was desirable. It was only when she got older and the social issues manifest themselves that a "problem" becomes apparent.

I'm 42 and although I've always known I was "different," I associated Aspergers only with boys. We live and we learn!

They also used to think ADHD only showed up in boys.

I would expect it to follow a simular pattern to Low Functioning Autism that is more common in males then females and, cannot be "masked".

I read an interesting report that 60% of diagnosed Aspie females are lesbian. Autism is a primarily male-brained phenomenon which makes me curious if it something in the androgen levels.

Show me any genetic study that proves its sex-linked genes. As far as I know there aren't any, because we don't know what genes contribute to ASDs yet.

I think it is closer to 1:1 and females just don't get diagnosed as much, for reasons already stated above. Testosterone, estrogen, and cultural expectations all have an effect on peoples' behavior so its entirely possible that boys are acting out in ways that get noticed more often than girls.

Well, I maintain hope.

Certainly more then this guy believed. I expected WP to be a sausage festival.

interesting.

I would like to see your source and documentation for this report. Especially since testosterone (or lack of it) does not a homosexual (male or female) make. It always amuses me when folks think their is a list of all 'diagnosed' Aspie females (or males). Do people really think there is a data base with all our names dutifully listed there with our credentials? Not bloody likely.

Female Aspies PRESENT Asperger's Syndrome DIFFERENTLY than male Aspies. Hans Asperger himself declared that women did not/could not 'have' AS, although he changed his mind later in his career.


However I did revel in the idea that Aspie females were the 'rarest of the rare', but I have had to disabuse myself of that conceit early on in my (late in life) diagnosis.

Merle

We (females) definitely are masking better. We had a 9 page thread that I started here on the subject. I started a petition to help the DSM-V committee to be more sensitive to this fact.

You see, the females diagnosed are lower in intelligence than the males. So, it is becoming apparant to many researchers that they need to find out why. The hypothesis is that they are not identifying those higher on the spectrum.

My Petition for Better Diagnosis of Girls

Here's a good research article about what I'm talking about:\

Detecting Females with ASD-Shana Nichols

sez who? That (non-existant) list of diagnosed female Aspies?

Please, don't get me wrong, all I am saying is I would like to see the documentation on all the stats and conclusions drawn that are being reported on this thread.

that's all.

This is how I feel about it.

Because we can't know whether it's sex-linked yet, and the fact that of all the people with ASD I've met, the numbers of women and men are about even. Not all of them were diagnosed officially, so they don't really get "counted" in studies. The ones that weren't diagnosed were better at "faking normalcy," so to speak. I think it's likely that the social pressures on girls are different than on boys. Women are supposed to be the emotional sex, and men the rational sex, so a girl is under more pressure to be socially acceptable at a younger age.

(Or maybe it's sex linked after all and we just haven't found out yet! I honestly am just guessing here.)

You know, I actually think the male brain is probably more susceptible to autism than the female. I do genuinely think that there are more boys with the condition than girls. But partly the fact that girls are diagnosed less too, but even if all girls were spotted and diagnosed, there would still be more boys.

Hope I didn't offend. Here is what I read- Donna Williams' blog:

http://blog.donnawilliams.net/2008/03/2 ... pie-women/

It interested me cuz I am actually gay myself and have Aspie traits. I wonder why I'm gay as well as why I seem quite Aspie-ish.