Why is Asperger's so much more common these days?

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It's most plausible that people are now getting diagnosed who weren't before. There's a huge demographic of teens and adults who never got a diagnosis, and since there's more information on different, non-steryotipical autistic behaviors (especially between the sexes), more people are getting a diagnosis.

I think it might be due to the fact, there are more diagnostic tools out there which can help individuals better able to identify persons on the spectrum possibly.

Was Asperger's perceived differently in the 90s to what it is today then? I heard Asperger's was discovered (by a guy with an ugly surname) in 1994 I think it was, but still tons of children, except me, still went unrecognised.

Asperger's is what I meant when I said "guy with ugly surname", because I just think it's an ugly word. I wish he was named Kingsley or something. "Kingsley Syndrome" rolls quite nicely off the tongue.

Maybe "perceived" wasn't the right word. It's just when people see this thread they think of the years prior to 1990 when Asperger's wasn't a thing. But I'm talking about the 1990s and 2000s, preferably from 1994 to about 2010, when Asperger's was known in the UK (otherwise I wouldn't have had the diagnosis of Asperger's in 1998), but in the last 7 or 8 years Asperger's diagnosis seems to be so common in children that I know of. I was just asking if back in the 1990s and even 2000s it was based on stereotypes more, where as now the knowledge of Asperger's is even more broad.

I wasn't being sarcastic about any posts here.

I never even heard of the disorder until 2007 when I first joined this forum. I think more and more people are hearing about it because over the years more and more people have accused me of having it and I'm female.

One psychatry said based on my childhood psych reports about how I had meltdowns, needed social skills therapy and was obsessed with narrow topics that I might have easily gotten an ASD diagnosis if I was a kid nowadays, but I was a kid of the 80's-90's and I got back then a label of ADHD/ severely emotionally impaired.

Heck new "disorders" keep emerging, DMDD is a "new" childhood mood disorder definded mostly as a child that resembles childhood bipolar but is definded by frequent meltdowns and irritability. These kids used to be considered a part of childhood bipolar, I actually wonder if I fell in this category too due to the huge amount of meltdowns I had as a kid and still have on occasion.

Being introverted is a personality trait, whereas AS is a developmental disorder which affects the way the brain processes information and consequently the way we think. The characteristics common to both AS people and introverts are:


- They usually prefer to be alone and choose solitude

- They may avoid loud social environments such as parties or clubs.

- They usually have fewer friends

- They may and lack confidence and be reluctant to try new things.

- They may suffer from anxiety and find it hard to approach people and join in conversations.

- May have difficulty with eye contact.



People with AS have these traits, but as was pointed out above, may be extrovert. In addition, people with AS have other traits that introverts don't experience:



- sensitivity to sensory input, mainly noise, touch and light.

- adherance to routines, or intense dislike of sudden changes to routines.

- Fine and gross motor impairment (clumsiness, poor coordination, bad handwriting, etc)

- Cognitive delay or slow processing speed. Inability to process information as fast as peers, which makes participation in conversations difficult because they can't keep up with the conversation. Introverts without AS don't experience this.

- difficulties maintaining concentration or attention.

- Intense interests on which they can sustain focus for a long time.

- Difficulties recognising and controling emotion, becomes overloaded easily and reach meltdown faster.

- Different way of thinking: more intense, linear and detail orientated.

- Difficulties with non-verbal communication: finds it hard to recognise or pick up on facial expression, moods and body language.

- Is not aware of the social funcion of verbal communication, especially in childhood, and uses speech as a means of exchanging information rather than for social communication



So actually, AS is quite a lot more than being just a bit shy or introverted.

A diagnosis that only make you feel excluded from society and it changes absolutely nothing and you are destined for a life of loneliness, isolation and misery.

I remember as a child, very early 70s, I was watching "night gallery" and noticed my first exposure to any depiction of autism. I thought at the time, "that guy up there is just an extreme version of ME!"