Here we go again--Asperger's linked with violence

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I just realized something. All Asperger's traits might stem from the diminished ability to assume. Aspies are always trying to become more knowledgeable, in order to compensate for this diminished ability. Aspies analyze everything to make sense of the world around them that they cannot assume much about, so they develop stronger senses. Aspies have trouble with cognitive empathy, because they have a hard time making assumptions about the situations of others. Aspies have problems with executive function, because they have trouble assuming how to proceed in a situation. Aspies sometimes become confused and frustrated due to this diminished ability, which often leads to meltdowns. It all makes sense, doesn't it?

Its an intresting theory, but I am not sure it entirely makes sense....I think there is a lot more to it then a potential diminished ability to assume. For me personally when it comes to 'cognitive empathy' its not so much that I can't more or less assume about the situation of others its more its hard for me to express the empathy...not knowing what to say or do. Though I find much of the time its better not to assume too much about someone elses situation since you could be completely wrong and make an unfair judgment based on an inaccurate assumption.

But it's helpful to be able to make some assumptions about how a person is going to react, when deciding how to express empathy towards them. Logic and reasoning can compensate for lack of ability to assume as part of cognitive empathy, but it's not as quick or automatic.

I will disagree... Pay close attention... Aspies assume A LOT... That people are interested in our interests, that people are logical, that people should think like we do, that our path of logic should be obvious to anyone and that anyone who does not see it is an idiot, that we are smarter than those around us...

Has anyone read the Anatomy Of Violence by Adrian Raine? He's a psychologist/criminologist professor and he talks about Lanza in his book. He thinks that Lanza's extreme asocial aloofness is better explained by Schizoid personality disorder.

Imho its also a better match match of the descriptions of Seung Cho, Brevik, the guy at LAX. Ive always felt that asperger gets shoehorned into explaining the bizarre personality traits/mannerisms in those kind of people. and the talking heads just couldn't come up with anything more plausible to pin it on.

(also from Salon) [ What mass murderers have in common:
A new analysis of the writings of various shooters finds a common strain of paranoia. ]

For the record, I'm NT and I want nothing more than to be educated. After reading through this particular thread, I decided to join instead of lurking.

Also, I think it is absolutely fair that NT persons make accommodations for non-NT people. Why shouldn't we? We're all people. We all have our conditions. If say, having fluorescent lights in public spaces we all use is an issue effecting people's quality of life, let's change it. Public spaces are open to accommodating persons with peanut allergies by making establishments peanut-free even though the majority of people don't suffer from the affliction. It's different, but it's really not...

You don't hear about all the planes that don't crash, and everyone lives and you usually only hear about autism when its a mass shooting or a human interest story. And how of you see the headline "bla bla is not linked with violence" especially if says "And the shooter was thought to have bla bla", people say 'oh yea right' .and the it doesn't help because logically people will know, but at the implicit level the idea gets re enforced. And since "Logic makes people think, emotion makes them act." it will lead to a cycle of more avoidance, then more resentment, and so on.

No offense to Raine, but raine did not interract with the boy on a regular basis... YOU CANNOT DIAGNOSE ANYONE that you do not interact with. Raine's speculation means little since he was not the boy's mental health professional.

I doubt Lanza was Schizoid. Schizoids generally lack sympathy towards other people, but they're not naturally malicious towards them, just indifferent. It'd probably take even more to drive a Schizoid to the point of becoming violent than it would for the average person, due to their lack of motivation and just not giving a crap about anything. Unfortunately, there are more people that try to push them in that direction though, because a lot of people like to harass people for being emotionally cold. A lot of Schizoids wouldn't feel bad about it if they did kill someone, but they don't naturally desire to kill people, and it'd take a lot to make them care enough to actually do it. They can only really become dangerous when they're strongly oppressed or mistreated to the point that they become enraged enough to act on it.

I would like some citations on this.. None of what you have stated is corroborated by the DSM... And I know a couple schizophrenics... and they do not fit your statements

Schizoid personality disorder, isn't the same thing as schizophrenia, so that might be why they don't fit that description.

link

Yes, they're completely different conditions with only a few similarities. The name is kind of deceiving. Schizoid Personality Disorder is about as similar to Schizophrenia as Asperger's is. I don't have any citations, but I've spent some time observing them on the Schizoid subforum on the Psych Forums. It's difficult to understand how a lot of people with different disorders think just by looking at the diagnostic criteria. I can't guarantee that some of my observations aren't misconstrued, but I've found that official psychiatric information about SPD is about as misleading as official psychiatric information about ASDs. It seems to be that way with most other disorders as well. At this point in time, it seems that the only way to really get a legitimate understanding of any of these people is to personally observe them. It's kind of sad that the psychiatric community has failed that badly.

Yes, my understanding of the situation is similar to Mike1's.

I think there is an issue here that we are missing.

I don't much care whether Lanza was Aspie, Schizoid or just plain messed up.

If somebody commits an act of mass murder, that person is responsible. The last thing I want to do is justify what Lanza did.

It is reasonable to look for causes when something like this happens.

The media (and most of the public) will look for the simplest explanation (that the killer was an Aspie/had Schizoid Personality Disorder/whatever).

This means that you can institute some simple responses to the "problem" (such as locking up or further marginalising the group to which the individual belonged).

Regardless of whether Lanza was an Aspie/Schizoid, I think this is the wrong question leading to the wrong answer. As Mike1 correctly points out "Schizoids ... really become dangerous when they're strongly oppressed or mistreated to the point that they become enraged enough to act on it."

Yes, absolutely.

Then ask yourself how many Aspies are consistently oppressed, mistreated and marginalised.
http://wearelikeyourchild.blogspot.co.u ... gence.html

I have no reason to believe the situation is much different for Schizoids (differential diagnosis for AS and SPD is tricky, or we probably wouldn't be having this conversation, so I imagine they face many of the same problems we do: indeed I wouldn't be surprised to find some misdiagnosed Schizoids around here).

I will admit here that I am angry at the odd species us aliens have to interact with (the site is called WrongPlanet for a reason!). I'm not angry enough to go out and commit mass murder, or even to go out and hit somebody (although I go to great lengths to avoid meltdown situations, just to make sure this doesn't change, and this is one factor badly affecting my existence), but I am angry. In my case, I've internalised it to depression, anxiety and self-hatred.

This leads me to suspect there may be some, perhaps with poorer anger management controls, or who have just been bullied and marginalised a bit more than me, who might just crack.

Indeed, with this in mind I'm surprised that Aspies are no more likely to commit violent crime than the general population. It's no secret that many of us are pushed enough.

So, if we want to look at causes, maybe it's also time to address the reasons why so many of us are bullied, oppressed, mistreated and marginalised. If we can stop that, maybe fewer people will lash out, Aspie, Schizoid or otherwise.

I discussed with my sources that I consult for my blog series (4 mental health professionals)... They state there are two similarity, but the pathology and symptomolgy of Asperger's and Schizoid personality disorder are divergent... The misdiagnosis between the two are only because the Psych professional did not spend enough time with their patient and not because they present the same symptoms

I'm not arguing they are the same. I'm arguing they are similar.

AS is distinguished from SPD by Aspies having problems with nonverbal communication (if there is one universal Aspie characteristic, this is it), unusual prosody, and patterns of restricted interests and/or repetitive behaviours (stimming, etc). You are also more likely to find conduct disorder in SPD. I would agree completely that a competent clinician should be able to tell the difference, but there are less than competent clinicians out there, a few with financial agendas.

That is light years from being able to make a confident differential diagnosis for someone who's dead.

The rest of my point, I think remains.

But the point was brought up that Lanza was diagnosed ASD, not Schizoid... I don't know who stated it and am on my way out the door for a gig, but my point is that they show a couple similar symptoms... The conditions, are not similar... and Lanza was diagnosed as ASD... And it is a valid diagnosis... His behavior was not typical of schizoid Personality Disorder...

I am stating simply that Aspies tend to question the diagnoses of others... and VERY FEW of us are psychiatric professionals... As such, any suggestion that we have with a differing diagnosis is just the speculation of an uninformed n00b