would a cult-like religion mask early AS?

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In another thread, btbnnyr said:

This may be true is normal society, but I think the opposite may be true in highly controlled religious movements (aka cults).

Some groups focus on molding children to be obedient and regimented from the earliest age. They praise those who adapt to routine, have no interest in outsiders, and obsess about doctrinal details. I have seen research that indicates that in my old church children very quickly reach high levels of maturity (for their age), but never move past that when adults.

Social interaction? We had no meaningful social interaction with outsiders (except trying and failing to convert them), and social interaction within the group meant following very simple rules: the more obsessive and narrow your thinking, the more you were admired. We had no time for normal stuff like hanging out - all free time was either meetings or study. From as soon as I could stand and talk (around the age of three) I was standing in front of the class being fake. It was all an act, playing a role, but this ability to stand up and follow rigid patterns inexplicably made me popular. As a result I had no problems with standing in front of class at school, and was eager to please, so was assumed to be socially advanced at a young age. Yet I had only one friend (he was not close) when when we later drifted away and I met him again (I was between five and seven) I remember hiding behind my mother's legs.

Repetitive interests and behavior? Every night of the week was mapped out for me, and the more narrow my interests (as long as they were whatever the church said) the more I was admired. I could sing the songs and remember the details. I couldn't understand why everyone spoke about the desire to sin: my only desire was to conform to these simple rules that made me, with no outside-world social skills, so popular. Everyone saw me as unusually holy and destined for great things.

Unusual verbosity, literalness, obscure metaphors and strange intonation and prosody? It gives an otherworldliness that makes normal folks admire you as a potential prophet. I have often heard speculation that the great prophets had different psychological conditions: not just an aspergers-like separation and obsessive focus, but other psychological quirks like voices in the head. I think there is a great deal of truth in that.

Stimming? If you grow up constantly surrounded by other people with strict ideas of what is right, any quirks are very quickly suppressed. I used to make high pitched noises, but my sister soon stopped that. I used to always turn round when at the bottom of stairs to make sure that I ended each day facing exactly the same direction as I started, with no more right turns than left turns. After a year or so, aware of my sister's criticism and the fact that no prophet would do that, I learned not to.

Of course, none of this applies to severe autism. That would still show through as unusual, but for a young child, high functioning aspergers would be evidence of spirituality and an example to be followed.

Does anyone else have experience of a cult-like religion in childhood?

Trapped in hades.

I think any homogeneous community , say, the "Amish," would provide this "masking stability" vs. a heterogeneous progressive culture. The latter would be a dynamic that 'cuts' in routine and knowns.

I could see it as a workable paradigm, when young.

It would smother someone on the spectrum latter in their life, I believe. Everyone is piled onto another in groups: I visited an area of the "Amish," and the whole family moves as a mass,( no pun) even when outside working. No eye contact when "outsiders" are around, unless they are selling something -- they move around you as if you are invisible-- "It's the will of Landru"-- look. (A Star Trek episode- "The return of the Archons.")

Last edited by Mdyar on 31 Aug 2011, 1:59 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Interesting ideas.

I'm curious as to which religious sect you were involved in.

My one thought is that it seems many on the spectrum don't chose their narrow interests based on a social response. If I like trains, it doesn't matter what other's responses are. I like trains, period. I suppose that a special interest can only evolve towards things to which an autistic has been exposed. I can't like trains if I have no awareness that they exist. So if a cult was completely insular, it might be plausible that special interests would evolve according to the stimulus of that environment and hence religious themes would dominate. But if there is sufficient contact wit the outside world, a special interest could easily emerge that has nothing to do with the sect. In this case, I would think that such an interest would be considered sinful since an obsessive focus on something "not god" would be "bad".

I was a Mormon. But I have to emphasize two things. First I took it far more seriously than any Mormon I know, and second, life was very different in the church in Britain the early 1970s, compared with, say Utah today. Most Mormons are fairly normal, but if you go back in time and to the fringes it can be very cult-like.

One of my earliest memories was at the age of three, helping to build our local church - back then the member built the buildings. As a church we did everything together. Two long church meetings on Sunday, staying in the building in between, then a church family night on Mondays, youth activities on Tuesdays, pretty much meetings or visiting other members every night. And when we weren't having local meetings we were driving up and down the country to regional activities. It was a strange sort of social life - constantly busy, constantly seeing people, but never connecting in any meaningful way - there just wasn't time. I had no concept that socializing was supposed to be a choice, or fun - it was a duty - you had to attend everything. It was just what you did.

My other earliest memory was also at age three, cycling up and down my street on my little tricycle, singing at the top of my voice. I was always the loudest singer at church. I don't know at what stage I started to absorb Mormon teachings, but indoctrination was constant, in lessons, flannel boards, books, posters, etc., and as a lay church the members did all the teaching (my Dad often ran the branch). Back then Mormons were proud of their unique beliefs. We openly spoke about becoming gods, about the return of polygamy, hearing the call to march by handcart to Zion, we expected the Second Coming at any time, and it was even worse in the remote mission field: being so far from Utah we were convinced that Salt Lake City was some kind of heaven on Earth where sin was almost impossible and all the world admired and envied us.

It's hard to self-diagnose at such a distance, but the feeling of being cut off from other people was just normal Mormonism. Having no social embarrassment, I was a great missionary. I seldom went out to play with friends, so was seen as not being in danger - a sign of righteousness. As I got older I had no interest in dating, so that was more evidence of my holiness. My obsession was the church, and it paid off in status. By the time I became a full time missionary at 18 I knew the standard works (Bible, Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, Pearl of Great Price) pretty well. I won't say that I could recite every verse, but if you opened any page at random I could have told you what was on it with a fair degree of accuracy, just by looking at its position relative to the front and back cover. My first set of scriptures fell apart by the time I was 16 - every page had been marked, colored in, annotated, etc. I made timelines of Bible history and who begat who, made lists of evidences for the Book of Mormon, collections of pictures for each of the standard works, and so on.

I guess my point was that an NT would be at a disadvantage in the church back then: social embarrassment, the pull of "the world," the repetitive teachings and the need to study were all negatives. But to me they were positives: being weird was a strength. Being obsessive and avoiding change were strengths. I could appear extremely sociable while never having to actually connect with anybody. My parents look back on me being an exceptional child, and cannot understand why I no longer attend the church. But the things that appealed to me as a five year old, the repetitive stories and promises of great times ahead, no longer have any hold on me in my forties. But the main reason for leaving is that I took it so seriously that I studied my way out. I was unable to reconcile the beliefs and practices with the church's own goals, or the goals I thought it had when I was growing up. I was too obsessed.



Yes, definitely. I think if I was growing up in the church today it would be very different. Today there are fewer meetings (most of the weekly meetings were abolished in 1980), fuel is more expensive so you can't spend your whole life travelling to meetings up and down the country anyway. And they don't talk about the deep doctrines any more so there is less to excite people. Also there is far more competition for attention - more TV, computers, etc. Back then Mormonism was my whole life, but it was a different world.

Mormon?--do you mean the FLDS sect? I have seen several documentaries about them! Or "regular" Mormon?

My opinion is as follows:

People with an ASD who were raised in this situation would still have some symptoms of ASD.

My clarification and reasoning:

You mentioned social interaction. Indeed social interaction would be very different under cult-like living conditions. Any child would have a different sort of "normalcy" than kids on the outside. That being said, if you do have Aspergers, there would still be certain social interactions that ANY NT could would have gained naturally that you wouldn't be able to (for example, understanding the importance/meaning of eye contact communication, understanding facial expressions and body language, etc). These things, almost any NT with regular human contact would naturally pick up on because it is unspoken and untaught (and for NTs, is often communicated unconsiously). People with Aspergers would never have this come natural to them (some Aspies here have no or very few issues with this now, but generally speaking, these things have to be consciously learned by those Aspies; they do not tend to come naturally). So even if your social interaction was different from other kids, you would still have those naturally understood unspoken communication skills if you were NT.

Your love of routine that others may have followed but not quite as desired as much, could be an indication of AS, not a masking of it.

Your routine about the bottom of the steps sounds less like autism routine, and more like an OCD quirk though.

I have no idea whether or not you have AS or not, but some of the things you mentioned COULD be symptomatic of AS. These things don't appear masked as a result of growing up in your situation. It seems they were quite apparent, but unacceptable/suppressed in some ways. To me that is two different things, but maybe you consider them the same?

Anyway, if you think you have AS and it is causing you limitations in day-to-day life today, you may want to go get a professional's opinion. AS combined with your history can likely put a strain a person, so it could be beneficial to get some help with AS or with whatever else you may have.

Regular - but regular in the past is not regular today. I listened to a radio show about someone who escaped from the FLDS. Everything was far more extreme than regular Mormonism, but it all sounded so familiar. FLDS and regular LDS have the same beliefs, but FLDS just take them a lot more seriously. The mainstream LDS were like the FLDS until around 1905.


Agreed. But the church thing makes it hard to compare. I saw school as so unimportant. It was just a gap between home and church, the areas I cared about. So it is possible that I don't have Aspergers but simply didn't want to connect with outsiders. Yet I do remember hating eye contact - I would always blur my vision so I could look at someone's eyes (or usually just at one eye) without seeing them. And I remember having absolutely no interest in the things other kids enjoyed. But it is hard to compare myself with others since I had so little contact with them. Then when in a church situation there were usually just two or three other people my age (and I had zero interest in them as well). So a comparison is difficult.



I'm seeing a professional this Friday. But I'm not optimistic. I saw someone at the same place last year, and they refused to make a diagnosis, on the basis that they only diagnosed children. I live in a remote area with a low income, so getting a second opinion is not easy. But something - whether it's AS or something else - certainly causes me limitations. I just did a mental check list of my career, and something is definitely going on:

* First job: the only good one. I made animations on a computer. But the company went bust.

* Second job: worked for myself, but had to give it up because I hated dealing with customers.

* Third job: sacked because I told the boss exactly what he was doing wrong.

* Fourth job: cleaning toilets - despite being qualified to teach physics, and having a marketing degree and an IQ in the 140s.

* Current job - now off on stress leave because I can't cope with the boss

Something is going on, for sure.

My dream job? Just leave me alone in a corner with a computer. I've done some very advanced research on economics, and am currently programming a ground breaking game engine. If people could leave me alone without worrying about paying the rent, I know I can do great things in the long term. But the short term always gets in the way.

I think you're right that certain cultures could mask ASD in children. Off the top of my head, another culture might be a communist one full of rigid structures and lack of competition and personal expression. So the culture would diminish the differences between autistic and neurotypical children. It would take a sharper eye and more inquiring mind to notice the autistic children who are not so severe that they could not follow rules at all, and in that culture, sharp eyes and inquiring minds are few and far between. So a child who would have been noticed in mainstream American culture could be missed in a different culture.