andrewducker | Autism - somewhere down the line

Another one of my beliefs is that most of the traits that people have are variants. That there is no "autism" as an on-off problem, but rather that people diagnosed as autistic are ones beyond a certain point on that scale. Of course, the scales we measure on are entirely human inventions, and I suspect that over the next few decades, as our understnaind of both genetic and neural processes increases, we'll have a better understanding of what scales to measure on.

That is, I don't mean to say that "everyone is a bit schizophrenic", as much as "everyone has certain tendencies/character traits that when taken to extremes are the syndrome known as schizophrenia". For instance, I wouldn't say that everyone has an obsessive compulsive tendency, but I would say that everyone has a tendency to worry about things and/or have strange little rituals they engage in when stressful, and that when these are extreme enough they are identified as obsessive/compulsive disorders.

Anyway, I was thinking about it because of two Wired articles, one of which is an autism test and the other talks about the high occurence of autism in Silicon Valley and discusses the possibility that many 'geeks' are borderline autistic (or as I'd put it, further along the autism line). After all, the inclination towards abstract ideas rather than socialisation, the ability to concentrate on ideas for hours while ignoring all around them, all of it starts looking suspiciously like in order to be that kind of inventive person you need to be partially autistic.

Except that I'd put it a different way: Everyone has a trait (or set of traits) that makes them less inclined to socialise and more inclined to abstract thought. Those with very little are not inclined towards mathematics or writing, but more towards a strong socialisation and group activities. Those with a larger amount are inclined towards maths or writing or other activities that require a pair of spectacle held together by sellotape. Those with very large amounts are inclined to sit in the corner, focus internally and not notice the world outside of them except as it applies to their obsessions.

This, then gives some kind of explanation for why autism exists (if there's a normal distribution for 'abstractness', then you'd expect a certain percentage of people to be autistic).