New Word for "Special Interests"

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I have seen the phrase "circumscribed interests" before, which is a mouthful, but interesting.

I think of them as potential career options, which may not be the case in every situation, but often is.

I just call my interests my "thing"s. Like, "biology and forenisc pathology are my thing." People tend to understand what I mean, and it's a concept that gets across to NTs.
Even NTs usually have an area or two they find exceptionally interesting and devote themselves to. One of my NT friends is obsessed with linguistics in a way very reminiscent of an AS "special interest," but she is definitely not on the spectrum. So her thing is linguistics, my thing is biological sciences.

When I first saw this thread, I thought that someone was trying to relabel lobbyists as something more innocuous.

Obessive Interest sounds better then Intellectual Obsession. I mean really I would put my liking of airplanes and wanting to know ever thing about them as Intellectual Obsession. But if my like for Transformers and wanting to know ever thing about them falls into Intellectual Obsession then I have more wrong with me then I thought.

I think that may be way the call it Special Interests because it's grouped out over a number of different things.

Err, obssession is definitely the word with the most negative connotation in this case. Special interests and fascinations are much better.

When talking to NT's I refur to it as an AS person's "thing".

On of my friends on the spectrum uses "Aspie Obsession."

I just call them obsessions.

My special interests are there to reduce boredom and to stimulate. I do have some that I'm very obsessive about but most I just start because my mind needs stimulating.

So in latin: impello (stimulate)...hmm doesn't really flow off the tongue.

What about addicting interest? That's what they are. Addicting.

I just think I'll stick with 'interest'.

Well, i brought this up just because the word "special" in conjunction with a neural diagnosis almost seems to imply "special ed," which has a bit of a stigma to it (or feels like it). Just the way the cogs in my head perceive it . . . <shrug>. Its similar to the way my mother thinks "high functioning" makes HFAs (AS, PDD-NOS, etc) sound like machines.

Yes, my family tree has a lot of nuts.

Addicting/Addiction isn't good because it has negetive connotations.

I've never quite understood why it's special interests. Some autistic/aspie interests are different and unique but some are the same as NTs.

I like fascinations. Some of my interests, e.g. wolves, do fascinate me.

A couple of my NT friends will sometimes obsess about things in a way reminiscent of AS obsessions, so we have a running joke about it. If one of my (NT) friends sees a movie and becomes obsessed with it (downloads it, watches it over and over again, tells everyone about it), she/he will say, "Sorry, I have Asperger's for Avatar."
(Of course things tend to get less and less serious as the conversation goes on and inevitably someone will pull out a, "I have Asperger's for your mom!")

I always love how my friends and I can be lighthearted about AS and not make it into a touchy subject or something to be wary of. It makes things so much more comfortable that we can talk about it casually

Sometimes I use a word fixation or shorter: fix, fixa