Does "lot of people have autistic traits" starting to bother

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anyone?


Isn't this the same as saying that everyone has schizophrenic traits or saying everyone has narcissistic traits or sociopath traits or dementia traits or Bipolar traits or intellectual impairment traits or learning disability traits?

Yea we all get paranoid from time to time and may sometimes hear something that isn't there and we may get a phantom itch on our skin and we may think of something that isn't really true but we think it is.

It's true that we may all want attention from time to time and get jealous and also want to be praised for what we do and it's true that we may all lack empathy from time to time and not feel anything for someone and it's true that we all forget from time to time and get confused which we call a brain fart and we may all have a hard time understanding stuff from time to time and comprehending what we are trying to learn. And of course everyone may have a hard time understanding what they are reading and trying to write a report when they are very tired and have a hard time focusing when they are tired.

But yet no one says lot of people have learning disability traits or Bipolar traits or intellectual impairment traits or slow learner traits, or Alzheimer traits so why is it that we are all doing this about autism? I have been noticing the same about narcissism, "everyone is a little narcissist" and I hear the same about OCD. I also hear sometimes how all kids have ADHD traits but that also annoys me too when I hear that.

Honestly the "lot of people have autistic traits" is starting to annoy me and hearing how autistic traits are normal in the general population because I don't hear that talk about any other disorders but OCD and narcissism. Are we doing this to make ourselves feel better and to normalize ourselves? But yet I also see posts here where people write how annoyed they get when people tell them they go through that too or how that happens to everyone.

From my understanding something is only a trait if it causes you a significant impairment so when I hear someone has autistic traits, I see that they have some impairments that are associated with autism but they don't have enough for the diagnoses and they also have to work harder than lot of people so to say lot of people have autistic traits seems to be a overstatement. I have a hard time believing that many people on the train I ride on going to work all have autistic traits that put a strain on their life.

Unless I am missing something here.

An autistic trait need not be impairing in mild degrees. Hyperfocus in moderation is a good thing, special interests can lead to a career or enjoyment without causing a person problems.

People saying plenty of people do that can be dismissive, people saying so and so autistic traits is a normal thing that people used to get over but now it a disease used for excuses is insulting, that does make the statement most people have autistic traits not factual.

This was sort of addressed in my psychology class before I dropped out of college, basically mental disorders/conditions are extremes of 'normal' human behavior. So essentially most people have traits of various mental conditions, but not enough for a diagnoses...whether or not someone has a given condition depends on if it significantly impairs functioning and how many of the symptoms they have. It's certainly not a perfect system and has flaws, for instance in the case of personality disorders it doesn't always actually 'impair' functioning but they will still exhibit problematic extreme behaviors.

I think some people are exaggerating that that to mean things like 'everyones a little autistic, narcissitic, ect.' or maybe they just misunderstand, but that is not actually what it means.

The current understanding of the nature of autism seems to be that it is influenced by a large variety of genes and factors. Hence the existence of the spectrum, and how different we all are to each other. In that regard, a person could have a couple of *traits* of autism, without the combination necessary for a full diagnosis.

"We're all a little bit autistic" is facile, I agree, but there does seem to be truth in the assertion that a large number of people do have genes that could, in part, lead to autism.

Then there's med student hypochondria, in which upon learning the symptoms of a disorder, the person starts comparing it to himself/herself and imagining they have it. As people learn a little bit about Asperger's or autism, they may relate to one or more of the traits - but that doesn't mean they have it - so therefore, people who do must be faking it for special treatment.

Pretty faulty reasoning.

Like someone else just posted, if the traits amount to impairing function, the disorder is present. But med student hypochondria is one good reason, I think, to have a professional diagnosis instead of just self-diagnosis - because we can so easily delude ourselves, about ourselves.

But if an "autistic trait" doesn't impair you, it's not a symptom. But yet I heard on here from someone who has studied psychology that it can still count towards the diagnoses and I read in another comment just as long as someone has impairments, their other "symptoms" can still count towards their diagnoses. So I guess that means if someone has no impairments, they don't have autism.

I saw you say in another thread how there are autistic traits among the general population or did I misunderstood? I thought you meant many people have them but we just do them more often.

But yet no one says people have mentally ret*d traits or Alzheimer's traits or schizophrenia traits and so on so I don't agree that many people have traits of a disorder. No one is going to say someone has that Asperger's trait if they do a meltdown at a airport because they missed their plane for on their way to a funeral. That did actually happen in a foreign country and someone has posted that video online.

it is my understanding about how often these things need to happen to someone for it to be a symptom.

But what if they really do think they have it? I think if someone does actually believe they have it, they have something going on then. It might not be autism but it could be anything that overlaps with it.

But other than that someone who has lived a normal life and never had problems in their life and never had social issues or troubles fitting in or never experienced sensory issues or any obsessions, etc. then I agree they could be faking it or they have no idea what Asperger's really is because it's not a personality. But yet I have seen many people be so misinformed about it and not understand what it really is saying how AS is a bunch of bull and made up for people who are socially awkward or very smart or introverted and also saying how they do those things or saying they could have been diagnosed with it as a kid if AS was so popular then in their childhood.

I see hypochondria as a real thing so I don't see anyone with it as faking conditions. They really do believe they have it and feel they are experiencing the symptoms. I see it as a type of anxiety disorder and some type of OCD. Then there is such thing as somatic symptoms where a person does experience true symptoms of a disorder rather than it just being in their head. A person is so convinced they have it, they start to have true symptoms. But still, doctors wouldn't call it an autistic trait, they would call it something else. They did make up a new label for it and I think it's called somatic disorder or something. It's where a person experiences true symptoms of another disorder when they don't actually have it.

People do say when people get older they have "senior moments" or everybody does ret*d things every once in awhile which is similar. Mental Retardation and dementia have been known for a long time, Autism has come into the public notice recently and it came into public notice in an era of cynicism.

So that is where the term "That is so ret*d" came from and then for some reason it became a hurtful thing to say and then ret*d became unPC.

Yes that's my understanding of it too, I picked up the idea in psychology that mental disorders and differences are not absolutely discrete and unique phenomena but belong to a continuum or spectrum.

Whether or not it bothers me for somebody to say "lots of people have autistic traits" depends on where they're going with it. If it's just an innocent statement, fine. If they're using it as a way of playing down the condition of autism, or to glibly deny that somebody may have it or require a diagnosis, I don't like it.

That does exist, but it's also certainly possible to struggle with specific things throughout your life....learn of a disorder and find it fits your experience very well. this hypochondria doesn't occur in all instances someone learns of a disorder people aren't entirely incapable of self awareness and analyzing their experiences. I mean sure if someone who's never had much significant struggles hears of a disorder and starts freaking out they must have it because they have maybe two minor traits in common I could see questioning their analysis more. But in cases where the person has been wondering their whole life why they struggle with various things most people don't seem to, even if they turn out not having the disorder they think it is, chances are they have some disorder with similar features.

I don't think this is a good reason to assume anyone who's self diagnosed has 'med -student hypochondria'.

Alright well the traits/symptoms that exist in mental conditions aren't completely alien behaviors never observed in humans at any time....they are things that exist in general human behavior. basically its human behavior taken to an extreme or occurring more often than normal. like some people get bothered by a messy house but that doesn't mean they have OCD for instance....with OCD someone can be bothered by messes but they'll likely get more upset about it and have more of a 'need' to clean it up than someone without. People with autism have sensory issues, yet they aren't totally unique to us people outside the spectrum can certainly have sensitivity to various stimuli as well.

I have actually seen people freaking out online about their test scores like the time on Babycenter someone with AS posted what AQ score you get and a bunch of NTs were taking it and the ones scoring above 20 were freaking out.

On reddit, someone posted about asking women with autism what issues they face autistic men don't face and there were even comments in there by people freaking out because they could relate to some of the stuff they were reading.

After all no one wants to be autistic.

Also when I took a narcissistic test online it was saying to not freak out about your scores and it says everyone has a little bit of it and some of it is normal. What if the same is said about autism? Some autism is fine.

Of course my mom disagreed about everyone being a little narcissist because there is a big difference between symptom and the behavior. She thinks whoever said that are narcissists themselves and they are just saying that to make themselves feel better so people won't make a big deal out of their traits. They say everyone has a little bit of it to justify and to say "Don't up play my behavior when everyone does it."

I notice anything I did was always made a big deal while everyone else who does it, no one bats an eye so that is how I also knew I was different. Like with clean houses, I loved our house being clean and messes would always upset me and I couldn't relax until it was picked up. But yet I have seen my mom come home and be upset about our house not being clean and she has complained to me about it and I tell her "that was how I felt as a kid and everyone called it OCD so very weird." Now this is where I get lost and confused because I still feel sometimes I got picked on so I was thrown in therapy for it while everyone else can get upset about a clean house and not be seen as having something wrong with them. I do wonder why was it OCD for me but isn't for my mother? I feel the same about anxiety too. Why can other people get upset and no one calls it anxiety but when I do, it's called anxiety? I have said the same about Asperger's. Doesn't everyone get worse when they are upset and my husband said I go extreme with it.

My mom says my AS comes and goes and now I am hearing everyone has it at one point in their lives so what does this mean for me? Why is it that everyone else can have it but no one else will say theirs comes and goes and call it Asperger's but my mom says that about mine? It just doesn't make sense so I hate hearing now lot of people have autistic traits. Even in high school I said everyone interrupts so I didn't see why it was a big deal for me to interrupt. People interrupted me and I saw people do it all the time so I didn't see why I had to fix that about myself.

My aunt also gets very upset about messes too but yet she doesn't have OCD so why was that OCD about me as a kid and teen?

Last edited by League_Girl on 14 Aug 2016, 2:15 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Pretty much every symptom of autism is seen in NTs, but to a much lesser degree, so in a sense, it's true that everyone has autism to some degree. I see the autism spectrum ranging from the very social NTs at one end to the severely impaired nonverbal autistics at the other end. But it's wrong for someone to trivialize your condition and blow it off with "lots of people have autistic traits". For someone to be diagnosed with autism, it has to have major effects in their life. Sure, an NT may have trouble socializing sometimes or understanding body language, but it's likely nowhere near the impairment that an aspie faces every day.