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Male Centric Autism Narrative and Undiagnosed Autistic Women

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btbnnyr
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03 Jan 2015, 8:05 pm

Before recognition of HFA, most non-retarded autistic children were not suspected to be autistic, even ones with obvious autistic traits and functioning problems, but it seems like op is talking about a certain subtype of autism that causes girls not to be recognized by parents and teachers for autism assessment.


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wozeree
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03 Jan 2015, 8:10 pm

I think she's trying to say that Autism manifested itself in ways that caused alarms when seen in boys, but because of expected gender roles, those (almost same) symptoms caused no alarm when seen in girls.



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03 Jan 2015, 8:13 pm

Ganondox wrote:
btbnnyr wrote:
So the girls have no behavioral or functioning problems that bring the attention of parents and teachers and are not assessed for autism?


Well, no noticeable ones, but they usually have problems latter on in life. That is going with actual case information here, not just hypothesizing, girls with aspergers generally get diagnosed later than boys with aspergers for that reason. What they don't have is aggressive behavioral problems, and shyness isn't seen as behavioral problem.


You also have to remember that a lot of times the family may display some autistic traits so the behaviors may not cause distress for the parents.
Parent: Oh, so little Precious is just sitting in her room all day reading about Pomeranians and not playing with friends? Oh well...reminds me of my own childhood. Time to meticulously rearrange my record collection again.

Then mix that with a kid who may just sit quietly at school (perhaps dealing with a cacophony of inner thoughts) then you have quite a nice recipe for delayed diagnosis.



btbnnyr
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03 Jan 2015, 8:14 pm

How do these girls manifest behaviorally as highly empathic?
Generally, shy introverted appearing people don't manifest behaviorally as highly empathic.


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wozeree
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03 Jan 2015, 8:17 pm

btbnnyr wrote:
How do these girls manifest behaviorally as highly empathic?
Generally, shy introverted appearing people don't manifest behaviorally as highly empathic.


When I was a kid, I think I was much less able to be empathetic because I was really not understanding people very well. But I think I was an extreme case, from what I read, a lot of girls with Autism imitate other girls and try to cover up their own behavioral and confusion issues that way. So maybe it would manifest in imitation. Or maybe they had one or two friends or family members that they cared about.



btbnnyr
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03 Jan 2015, 8:24 pm

Being highly empathic towards family member is same as being highly empathic towards other person, since both patterns of behavior involve good social cognition. It is possible that some parents may only think that their children are highly empathic when their children are not.


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03 Jan 2015, 8:24 pm

btbnnyr wrote:
How do these girls manifest behaviorally as highly empathic?
Generally, shy introverted appearing people don't manifest behaviorally as highly empathic.


See Fluttershy for reference. She doesn't appear as particularly empathetic in the clip I posted, but in general she comes as the love-all-creatures empathetic, not the solve-all-the-people-problems empathetic.


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Last edited by Ganondox on 03 Jan 2015, 8:28 pm, edited 1 time in total.

zoidbreezy
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03 Jan 2015, 8:25 pm

wozeree wrote:
I think she's trying to say that Autism manifested itself in ways that caused alarms when seen in boys, but because of expected gender roles, those (almost same) symptoms caused no alarm when seen in girls.


Also, another thing that seems to be more common in girls, even if they do display some very autistic symptoms (stimming...etc). I think they are more likely to be diagnosed with things like "sensory processing disorder and anxiety."



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03 Jan 2015, 8:33 pm

btbnnyr wrote:
Being highly empathic towards family member is same as being highly empathic towards other person, since both patterns of behavior involve good social cognition. It is possible that some parents may only think that their children are highly empathic when their children are not.


I said "empathetic", not empathetic, clarifying good social cognition is not needed. It's quite common for someone to be more attune to the feelings of family because they are more familiar with their behavior and have more attachment to them, so no, it's not the same.


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btbnnyr
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03 Jan 2015, 8:34 pm

Ganondox wrote:
btbnnyr wrote:
How do these girls manifest behaviorally as highly empathic?
Generally, shy introverted appearing people don't manifest behaviorally as highly empathic.


See Fluttershy for reference. She doesn't appear as particularly empathetic in the clip I posted, but in general she comes as the love-all-creatures empathetic, not the solve-all-the-people-problems empathetic.


What are some eggsamples of autistic girls displaying behavioral pattern of high empathy and meeting criteria for autism but not being noticed or assessed or diagnosed due to people dismissing possibility of them being autistic due to their behavioral patterns of high empathy?

Like what would their highly empathic behaviors be?

What is "empathic"? What are some "empathic" behaviors?


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03 Jan 2015, 8:37 pm

btbnnyr wrote:
Being highly empathic towards family member is same as being highly empathic towards other person, since both patterns of behavior involve good social cognition. It is possible that some parents may only think that their children are highly empathic when their children are not.


That's probably true in a lot of cases, even some not having to do with Autism.

I think though that one thing that keeps Autistic kids from empathizing is obviously the social deficit problem, but it's probably exacerbated by being rejected and cut off from many normal social paths that kids take to help them learn empathy. So while they may not be able to understand the members of the large group with whom they have problematic relationships, they may be able to empathize better with friends or family simply by being given a chance to do so. Means of communication, etc. Depending on how severe the Autism is, it still may be problematic, as I mentioned seems to be the case with me even now.



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03 Jan 2015, 8:42 pm

Ganondox wrote:
btbnnyr wrote:
Being highly empathic towards family member is same as being highly empathic towards other person, since both patterns of behavior involve good social cognition. It is possible that some parents may only think that their children are highly empathic when their children are not.


I said "empathetic", not empathetic, clarifying good social cognition is not needed. It's quite common for someone to be more attune to the feelings of family because they are more familiar with their behavior and have more attachment to them, so no, it's not the same.


I'm pretty sure that btbnnyr means empathetic. Empathic - isn't that a science fiction thing? Like somebody who has unnatural ability to feel another person's emotions? Empathetic is more like understanding by common experience or learning about the world around you (I think).



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03 Jan 2015, 8:44 pm

btbnnyr wrote:
Ganondox wrote:
btbnnyr wrote:
How do these girls manifest behaviorally as highly empathic?
Generally, shy introverted appearing people don't manifest behaviorally as highly empathic.


See Fluttershy for reference. She doesn't appear as particularly empathetic in the clip I posted, but in general she comes as the love-all-creatures empathetic, not the solve-all-the-people-problems empathetic.


What are some eggsamples of autistic girls displaying behavioral pattern of high empathy and meeting criteria for autism but not being noticed or assessed or diagnosed due to people dismissing possibility of them being autistic due to their behavioral patterns of high empathy?

Like what would their highly empathic behaviors be?

What is "empathic"? What are some "empathic" behaviors?


Well Jen who posts here is very empathetic, she understands other people's feelings (she's 16 now).

I think Temple Grandin empathizes with animals, not sure how well she does with humans.



btbnnyr
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03 Jan 2015, 8:45 pm

Empathic and empathetic mean the same.


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03 Jan 2015, 8:56 pm

Holy cow, I just looked it up, you're right.

I was thinking of that empath on Star Trek, I'm pretty sure it was considered a super power of hers. I guess she was just REALLY good at it.



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03 Jan 2015, 8:59 pm

wozeree wrote:
btbnnyr wrote:
Being highly empathic towards family member is same as being highly empathic towards other person, since both patterns of behavior involve good social cognition. It is possible that some parents may only think that their children are highly empathic when their children are not.


That's probably true in a lot of cases, even some not having to do with Autism.

I think though that one thing that keeps Autistic kids from empathizing is obviously the social deficit problem, but it's probably exacerbated by being rejected and cut off from many normal social paths that kids take to help them learn empathy. So while they may not be able to understand the members of the large group with whom they have problematic relationships, they may be able to empathize better with friends or family simply by being given a chance to do so. Means of communication, etc. Depending on how severe the Autism is, it still may be problematic, as I mentioned seems to be the case with me even now.


When I was younger, I definitely understood the concept of empathy, but I now realize that I often didn't use it "in the moment." (still have problems with this). And if a child understands the concept of empathy, they may be able to display this knowledge in a controlled setting such as in a psychologist's office with fake examples (delaying diagnosis even further), but it's not going to come naturally to them on the playground. With family members, I was often able to go back and say I was sorry for doing this or that. Was still labelled as a "high-strung brat" by many family members though...