Pretend play not possible for kids with asperger?

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If only you could have seen all those massive orchestras I conducted heroically when I was a kid . . . but, of course, they always performed best when I was alone in my room.

And every now & then . . .

From the researcher who invented the concept of "Asperger's Syndrome":

http://www.mugsy.org/wing2.htm

Yes, what Wing wrote is how it is.

Either lining up toys instead of playing with them or playing a script with others as mechanical objects (like a literal movie script).

I did the former as a young child (4 and under), and I did the latter as an older child (people often never play along, so you tend to remove that element from it). I can only remember doing the latter too. The former comes from my mother.

The constant spinning of a toy wheel or whatever (fixated on a single part of a toy and only focusing on that) tends to be more of an autism thing.

Absolutely! I am running into this problem with my three year old.

I did do pretend play as a kid, but usually rejected pretend play WITH other children. The exception was with my brothers, who I could get to follow my "rules," occasionally, (one brother was on the spectrum, and the other much younger) and other autistic children, who I played pretend with just fine, up until about 7th grade (age 12?) when I stopped playing pretend, in public at least.

Graham is correct for me, though, in that I did not come up with dialogues. Most of my pretend play involved setting up a world to immerse myself in. I remember playing "covered wagon." What do I remember about it? Making the tent that was my "wagon" and packing and unpacking the provisions in my little trunk, over and over again. Searching the house for more acceptable provisions to squirrel away in my wagon. Making everything perfect. The "world" was important. The story line? Not so much. Characters? Almost never. Most of my favorite childhood fantasies involved a world where all of humanity had disappeared, and I was free to explore the world, safely, alone.

I didn't understand pretend play. I thought it was stupid. I remember playing cowboys and indians with my sister, and was annoyed that I was the one who kept getting captured. I liked the running around part and making noise but that's about it. What was the point of following someone else script? I didn't understand playing house either. Why would anyone want to do that? We already lived in a house and adults were boring. What would I want to copy them?

Sounds about right, though I'm sure not all cases are one or the other. Logic dictates that there would be at least a few cases where the imagination is what is perceived as normal.

I played pretend a lot, and I consider myself very imaginative. Most of my play involved extensive world building and character development and I would play out similar plots repeatedly, but I would hardly consider that a lack of imagination. No plot is entirely original even for neurotypicals. I was more interested in how subtle changes to the imaginary world would impact the plot, anyway. Perhaps this is another instance of psychologists observing behaviour through their own preconceptions rather than actually listening to people.. I'm sure most of my world building looked like meticulously arranging things and staring into space.

But she makes it sound like all aspies have trouble with pretend. There are some whose pretend play is as rich and varied as any NT's. There are also some who have overly intense pretend play (me, for example).

I didn't have any problems with pretend play as a child. I was always using my imagination, and I could engage in pretend play with other children too. I remember imagining the same things as others because I remember playing with NT kids for hours.

The only games I found difficult were games like It, Hide and Seek, those sorts of games. It was because some kids decided to show off when playing those sorts of games, and others would try and cheat or tease, and I always ended up being It in whatever game we played, and so my cry was always ''it's not fair!'' I used to get upset if I lost games as well, whether they were board games or practical games. But sharing imagination with fantasy games with other children was something I enjoyed.

I had no problems with pretend play. I had (and have) a really good imagination.

I don't know that it's not possible...not sure where they get that. Or does it mean they don't play along well with others playing pretend or what.

Most do, probably. Being completely "objective" is not very likely--there's always a "filter" of one's own experiences, whether one realizes (or admits) this or not.

*(Not sure if I have it or not)

I played pretending to be a Pokemon trainer and Dragon Ball with my only friend (only with him and only on my own terms) at elementary school. Everyone told us we were very childish.

Bulldust
all I did as a kid was pretend play! Too much! School was a different story though...
In fact even as an adult embarrasingly still have quite random thoughts and imaginations.

Ditto, although I did catch up some of the pretend stuff later on when I was babysitting in my late teens, I did pretend interview/talk shows with a 12 year old I "babysat", which was quite a lot of fun and I came up with some pretty bizarre and funny stuff.

Haha. Aspie instance right there. I bet your Mum thought that was a bit weird.