Transgender-folk and Autism

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Transgender people up to six times more likely to be autistic than those whose gender identity corresponds with birth sex, Cambridge University study shows:

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech ... mailonline

Or autistic people more likely to be transgender
Especially, not identifying with the narrow, pre-defined gender concepts may be quite common among the ASD folks.

"Oh, that is beautiful
You know what I heard, I heard
I heard two girls over here singing in harmony, that's all right, honey
This is a free country, live like you wanna live, baby!
Yeah, ain't nobody gonna knock it, doll, mm-mm
Yeah, freedom
Yes sir, there's one guy right over here singin' "mine" too, that's all right, brother!
Yes sir, you got a right, baby, ain't nobody gonna bother you, tell you"

---Chuck Berry

How much is real and how much is an autistic obsession. I was very adamant at one point that I wanted a sex change. DX was listed as schizophrenia with disorder of gender identity . After quite a while it dawned on me that with my history of severe mental illness there was an iceberg in hell's chance of being accepted for the transition process.

It also dawned on me that my inadequacies as a person would be there whether male or female re day to day functioning. I made a conscious effort to accept that though I may have such thoughts I'm ill equipped to handle what can be a difficult process.

I'm not at all surprised, just another layer of non conformity to social norms

Are you implying willful non-conformity?

Nobody chooses to be autistic or trans-gender.

I certainly didn't think 'I can get a non conformist badge of approval if I do this'

Isn't Daily Mail a tabloid? Look at all the trash to the right of the article text. Perhaps not a reliable news source.

This was discussed on the Autism Science Foundation podcast. The presenter said that transgender people scored significantly higher than non-transgender people only on social traits of autism, which could be explained by social isolation (rather than greater likelihood of being autistic).

I think people who are different just tend to be different in more than one way.

But people choose to analyze themselves, be honest with themselves and come out of the closet in spite of the pressure to conform. Maybe autistic people do that at higher rates?

Being transgender doesn't necessarily have anything to do with social non-conformity. Plenty of trans people are very much into conforming to social norms associated with the opposite sex. Gender role conformity is the primary non-medical way of "passing" in fact.

While I'm not the sort to think that everything is correlated with autism, I do actually agree on this one. There seems to be a lot of transgender people here on WP and, like some people have already pointed out in this thread, a lot of autistic people struggle with gender identity and gender norms.

I do struggle with conforming to some female norms, but I am not transgender. I still identify as a woman.
But I don't wear makeup much, I'm not into having particular brands of perfume, I have never dyed my hair, I have never got my ears pierced or any other parts of my body, I don't have a tattoo, I bite my nails and don't wear false nails to cover them, I don't wear skirts or dresses (I only wear a dress if I'm going to a formal occasion), and I don't have a hairstyle that's too high-maintenance.
But there are things that do make me typically female. I like reading magazines, I like watching emotional drama shows and I dislike watching sports or action movies, I have a high level of emotional empathy, my interests have always revolved around people rather than facts, I can't go out without my purse (handbag), I like wearing stylish clothes, I love shopping for clothes and bags, I love hanging out with family/friends or talking on the phone (as in chatting about anything and everything), and I love soaking in a bubble bath and buying things like bath bombs and bottles of bubble bath.

Last edited by Joe90 on 08 Aug 2020, 12:00 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I'm not different, I just can't find anybody like me...

I'm not different, I just can't find anybody like me...

I'm both and it makes for a very interesting ride through life.

I wonder how this plays with the tendency of autistic girls to mask by copying social behaviours from other girls?

I'm thinking of the case of male children with gender dysphoria (since that's what I have personal experience with...). Whether we'd be more likely to copy boys and so mask any femininity as children.

Hmm.