Do you think Asperger's Syndrome is over diagnosed?

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In whole Lebanon ....I just met online ONE aspie.

I have been thinking maybe lot of people have it. Just like lot of people have dyslexia or other learning disabilities. In my high school, there were kids who had dyslexia but not all of them were in special ed.

It's possible there are people being diagnosed with AS over a few traits because they meet 2 or 3 in the AS criteria instead of two from the first part, one from the second part and all the bold. I have seen some people on the internet who would get undiagnosed with AS because they were diagnosed with it over meeting two or three parts from the criteria.

There are also people who have traits of it but don't have the condition. I don't really care if undiagnosed peopled say they have AS. They know themselves better than anyone on the internet.


I think there are still lot of undiagnosed aspies out there which are adults. Most of them who are being diagnosed are kids or teens because it's something new in our country still, only been 14 years since it's been in the DSM. Parents take to get their kids tested to see what they have because they are having problems and bam AS is suspected. Or parents take their kids to see a psychologist because they are having difficulties and the parents don't know how to help them. And there are some who happen to come across AS and notice it sounds like their child, so they go and take them to see if they have it or not and it's confirmed that they do.
There have also been teens who would come across AS on their own and suspect they have it, go tell their parents and bam they get tested for it and it's confirmed they have it.

Well, since there is no genetic test for Asperger's Syndrome, all it really is is a collection of traits. If you have the traits you are an Aspie. I think there might be some people who have been misdiagnosed as AS. But I think there are even more people out there who are undiagnosed Aspies. Heck I'm reasonably sure the girl I went to prom with is an undiagnosed Aspie, I never got the chance to ask her any questions that could have confirmed it however.

Indeed.

And whenever I've been to school, there's been just about exactly the number of people who seem obviously like undiagnosed autistic people, that you'd expect from the number of people at the school, too. Which is a lot of people, really.

I also think the posts to this thread that say "Autistic people aren't all like me, and I don't understand all autistic people, so the ones I don't understand or that are not like me, are not really autistic," say more about ignorance of the diversity of autistic people, than they do about who is really autistic and who isn't. I've found among autistic people that a sizable minority are a lot like me (and we tend to recognize each other pretty readily that way), and the majority are not. And what I just said is true of most autistic people -- most are not like any one person, but lots are. Autistic doesn't mean clones of each other, there are many different expressions of the same underlying stuff, and IMHO it's pretty destructive (whether intentional or not) for people to run around acting on the belief that all autistic people have to be Just Like Them in order to be real. I went to school with somewhere between fifteen and thirty other autistic people at one point, and only identified much with one of them (we became friends quickly due to mutual interests and similar body language/etc).

Wait until you've literally met hundreds of autistic people before you make judgments like that, and make sure you've met a variety, too. I've met enough diagnosed autistic people (with dxes of autism, AS, Rett's, and PDD-NOS) to know that the difference between diagnosed and self-diagnosed is most often a matter of which professional has seen them at what point in time, and often also a matter of age, social class, region, etc. as much as anything. And that there is massive, massive variety even within each autism-related label.

I'm also not sure what's with the extreme amount of doctor-worship in the autistic community.

If those stats are true, then why aren't they considered to be epidemics and autism is? I'd really like to know that.

I think it is under-diagnosed, especially in females. However I have seen a few individuals on TV who were diagnosed with AS and they did not seem even remotely impaired. There was a documentary on the Discovery Channel about "genius sperm donors" and one guy had a son produced by sperm donation who had been diagnosed with Asperger's, and he didn't look it to me at all. But, maybe he'd been heavily therapized.

I suspect that like many things, it is over-diagnosed in some populations and under-diagnosed in others. That's how diagnosis tends to work in general, with any condition.

Of course they don't look impaired because they look like everyone else. Even they seem normal to me. AS is closer to normal than autism.

I've seen other people who I've found out later have been diagnosed with Asperger syndrome and I can tell that they have AS. People with AS tend to carry themselves different than NTs. I don't know how else to explain it, but I can usually tell if someone has AS. AS people are markedly different than NTs, at least, they are to me.

I don't know who in their right mind would "want" to have the condition. It's only those who don't who could actually want such a thing. Some seem to like their triats. Maybe they get lots of love and support from loved one's that make it a different experience for them. It's only a living nightmare from my perspective.

How do they look different? I see they look like everyone else. They are everywhere. I can walk into a store, see a guy looking at videogames and wouldn't guess he has AS.

Even Temple Grandin seems normal to me. I have seen her videos. Alex too. I guess I don't know how to pick up on something. I can only tell if they act any different like what Amanda does or that one kid on the news about the spelling bee seemed awkward.
I knew one aspie in real life and boy did he seem normal to me until I went over to his house and boy was he a bully. He manipulated his mother by abusing her and he screamed at her. I couldn't believe she let him get away with all that. I thought at the time that's how aspies act and I was supposed to act that way too but his mother told me he had ODD.

This is exactly why there needs to be a super secret handshake!

There is one, or better, around 33 million ones.

i think i am a bit lower functioning than most here. i see autism from within and i very much know how it feels, but i guess you just have to take my word for it (as all do on forums). i think the idea of autism has become popularized.

i am only slightly above HFA.

there is profound, then LFA, then MFA, then HFA, then asperger syndrome.

the problem with me and all true autistics, is a deficit in a "mirroring" mechanism due to a organically neuronal insufficiency.

people who say they are AS often seem to me to be not autistic at all.

like, in real life, when someone smiles, i never smile back if i do not see the joke.
even if i do see it, i maybe will not feel like smiling so i will not.
maybe they are not even joking. maybe they are just being......
who knows.

their "feelings" do not enter my soul and that is why i can not mirror to them back what they feel.

so i wonder how some people who say they have autism, have such a popularity rating with their many friends.

how did they get them? could they mirror back to them?
that is like reciprocation, and i am a train off the rails shuddering over the concrete sleepers when it comes to reciprocation.

i am smart enough, but there are smarter autistics.
maybe they may have "cracked" that world of reciprocation that all my mathematic style thought could not identify.

i can not dance with others, but by my self i can swing.
other people are like interference to me. no matter how much i like them as people.

how can some AS people (who i see as pretenders) have such a flourishing social life, and also such a command on their communicativity ?.
sigh...........

so i just hope that the amount of people who claim themselves as "asperger sydromites" does not balloon into a fad.

i think that the condition i suffer is not to be bandied about and alloted to any old person who wants to jump in the boat.

i think that if a doctor has diagnosed you, then you are qualified to say you are AS. (it still may not be correct but it is enough)
you may say that you are as smart as a doctor and can do away with the professional diagnosis.
yes, but you are also possibly biased and a doctor is definitely not biased.

so i really mean that i think that the bulk of "self diagnosed aspies" are erroneous, but i do trust the bulk of professionally diagnosed ones.

it is important not to advertise in too fanciful a way, the ways of AS, as there will be flocks of NT's who just crap anything and learn the basics to "get in".

that is what i think and i am probably wrong but i do not care.
it is my thought.

i am participating in an fMRI study which will hopefully evaluate me either way (for free)... but as a poor college student, i've already emptied my purse exploring the venues available to me.

of course your thoughts are valid...

but there's only so much anyone can do about these things.

Years and years of practice. I guess in your eyes I am a pretender. I used to worry maybe I was one, but an MRI revealed gray matter anomalies that are supposedly unique to autism.

I stopped talking when I was eight until about twelve with the exception of a few words (at twelve nothing at all). I understood the language technically. But I did not understand the social things. I was interested, I cared about people, but I couldn't interact with them in any socially acceptable way.

I dedicated my life to the study of facial expressions, body language. I am technically not empathetic - there is no natural skill for me to interpret expressions, to look into the eyes, to feel what another is feeling just by seeing them feel it. However, if someone told me how they felt, then I felt sympathy. When I learned the unconscious cues they gave me, I was able to be extremely sympathetic to the point where sometimes people think I am empathetic!

Now I have many friends, well, not many, but several very understanding ones. Including a fiance.

You seem to have very intense AS. So you are farther down on the spectrum than I am. But I am still on the spectrum; I still have a diagnosis. I am still autistic. I am just not as autistic. But it still influences every part of my life.

I have what they call "atypical Asperger's". Also I am a girl. Maybe that's why it is easier for me.



Definitely one of the most, probably the most, important criteria for AS. Problems with mirror neurons. Stimming, rocking, and sensory issues also help define us...also, new evidence shows humans are actually able to grow new neurons, forge better connections, so maybe all that extreme practice helped me with that...? Maybe it could help you too. I am sorry your experience has been so difficult.


It's always good to have an opinion!


Super cool.

Last edited by Aurore on 18 Aug 2008, 9:32 am, edited 3 times in total.