The New RAADS-R Test is Impossible to Answer

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There is an online Aspie test called RAADS-R that I know many of you are familiar with. I could have sworn I took this about 10 years ago and it was different. I just tried to take it and I don't even know how to start answering the questions. This new format makes it impossible for me to answer anything as most of the answers don't apply.

It gives four answer choices:
True now and when I was young
True only now
True only when I was younger than 16
Never true

I believe they used to give answer choices such as:
Mostly agree
Somewhat agree
Somewhat disagree
Mostly disagree

The way it is now, these are true and false questions. I can't give an answer because my answers are neither true nor false. Many of my answers fall into the category of "somewhat agree" or "somewhat disagree." I cannot answer most of these questions. The answer choices simply do not apply to me.

How the heck am I supposed to take this test?

Take question 74 as an example:
74) I don't like to be hugged or held.

I can't answer that. I don't mind being hugged by certain people and in certain circumstances. I don't mind at all when my veterinarian hugs me - she's a cool person with a good heart. I didn't mind when my favorite auntie hugged me, though I preferred when she did that in private because it was usually more emotional. I'm ok with a few other relatives. I have mixed feelings on my cousin's wife hugging me. I do not like my father or anyone on his side of the family to hug me.

So I can't answer that question. I would answer that as "somewhat disagree," but that's no longer a choice. But it's not true, and it's not false. So how am I supposed to answer?

I think that would be a false. AFAIK if you don't like hugs, at best you will only tolerate them from certain people.

I know the AQ uses the 4 degrees of agreement with the statement. However, there are only 2 scores for the choices anyway.

The RAADS-R is meant to be taken with the benefit of somebody who knew you when you were younger, if available (And yes, it is not always possible to get somebody to help with it). You have to gauge whether you think a particular answer is "Mostly True" or "Mostly False" by way of what you think fits. For instance, do you like being hugged? Yes? Then the question is "Mostly False." Was this ALWAYS that way, or only when you were 17 or younger?

If you do not like hugs at all except by 3 people, who you only let hug you because you are familiar with them, then you can rate the question as "Mostly True," and then think back on whether this is only true now as an adult, or has always been true.

The question isn't altogether ambiguous, but I can see how it may cause some struggle or frustration. When I took it initially, I scored 151 for myself. But when I asked my mother to help assess the answers, I got a much higher score, 180, because she dispelled the seeming ambiguity that you are expressing frustration with. I felt some questions were too much "Yeah, I *can* do that, so it is true," but in reflection with my mother the questions because "Do I *like* to do that?" The answers were different and more clear that way.

I didn't like this test either. For some of the questions, my answer was "true only before I was 20." Which category does that fall into?

I read the paper that introduced this test, and they said that when they first gave the test in order to test its validity, they had a psychologist administer the test in order to answer clarifying questions. However, the paper didn't explain at all what points needed to be clarified or how clarification should be given. In particular, if a statement was true my whole life until some point when I was 19, then I have no idea how to answer the question. In my opinion, there are too many problems with the test, and the reviewers of the original paper should have asked for major revisions.

I tried taking it last week and gave up after ten questions. And no, those ten answers weren't right either. Then, I asked most of the questions to my clearly-not-autistic mother. She had little problem answering. I've read that this is generally the case - this test to help diagnose autism is specifically impossible for auties to take, at least when unsupervised. I'm not diagnosed but did once get evaluated. The clinician walked me through the questions, which is really the only way that these tests were meant to be administered.

ive found those tests don't work, if you try to give balanced(hehe) answers as; sometimes i do and sometimes i don't(never an option) you don't get autism results, but if you bluntly go for the 'never' or 'always' you be aspie
whatever
((the old r-r i was most nt-male but in the clumsy departement, why is aut female soo far out? bc they only have found severe aut females?))
and all tests do that, what's wrong with the designers, they copy blindly??? clownworld
i never waste my time on that s**t again, soooo manipulatable


as once you had the kid toy game electro
after some cards you knew which question-place corresponded to which answer-place, electrically
then you open the back and see its true

To me it feels like they wanted to present the same test to be taken twice from different perspectives - first from the point of view of when we were young, and then from the point of view of who we are now.

Unfortunately some clever designer got hold of it somewhere and decided to turn it into one single, convenient test. All they succeeded in doing was producing a set of ambiguous questions which are impossible for an autistic person to answer, thereby defeating the entire point of the exercise.

Chances are there were no autistic people involved in this process.

Chances are the guy who designed the DeLorean didn't have a garage.

I'm pretty sure the test was designed by NT people who have no understanding about how the ND mind thinks about such things. I had the exact same response as you with the hug question, and similar issues with many others. They seem to have the idea that everything is all or nothing all the time with us when that is far from true. I do not want to not be touched by most people, yet have no problem when my close friends want a hug or touch me. Their questions never allow for context affecting us in different situations, which seems like a very important variable to be ignored.

Most of these on-line "Are You Autistic?" tests seem skewed toward a positive result no matter how you answer.