Are autistic males more masculine than NT males?

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NewTime
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18 Dec 2017, 1:01 pm

I've heard that autistic people apparently have an extreme male brain.



TheAP
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18 Dec 2017, 1:07 pm

Well, I don't really buy the extreme male brain theory, but in any case, it's not referring to masculinity the way we tend to think of it, but to a preference for systemizing over empathizing. I think autistic males, stereotypically at least, are less likely to be into sports and other masculine things like that, and less likely to have the typical dudebro attitude.



lostonearth35
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18 Dec 2017, 3:39 pm

I thought autistic females were supposedly more masculine while males on the spectrum act less so.



Redxk
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18 Dec 2017, 4:33 pm

Not if I'm an example!



Joe90
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18 Dec 2017, 5:21 pm

How can that actually be possible? What makes a male "extreme male" anyway?


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ASPartOfMe
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18 Dec 2017, 6:42 pm

Explination of extreme male brain theory of autism invented by Cambridge University Professor Simon Baron Cohen

Quote:
Systemizing is defined as "the drive to analyze or construct systems" that "follow rules." 13 It also involves being able to predict the behavior of a system (as opposed to predicting or understanding the behavior of other people). 11 Males are, on average, more skilled at "systemizing" than females are. Think of mathematicians and engineers as good systemizers.

Empathizing is defined as "the drive to identify another person's emotions and thoughts, and to respond to these with appropriate emotion." It also involves being able to predict the behavior of people. Females are, on average, more skilled at "empathizing" than males are. Think of therapists and teachers as good empathizers.

The extreme male brain theory, meanwhile, views people on the autism spectrum as hyper-systemizers: people who are extremely interested in and engaged with rule-bound non-human systems, whatever their level of functioning. 14 For someone with less cognitive ability, "hyper-systemizing" might translate into collecting buttons, stones, or some other objects and organizing them by type. For someone with a higher IQ, it might translate into a huge catalog of knowledge on a particular subject, like insects, astronomy, or history -- a subject that is endlessly thought about, talked about, and expanded upon. Routine would be one form of system, and disruptions to routine would be upsetting because they interfere with expectations of a rule-bound system. Rigidity, not flexibility, would be the rule.

Empathizing, on the other hand, would be impaired in individuals with ASD. Reading social cues, noticing what others are feeling (let alone figuring out how to respond appropriately), and making sense of social hierarchies would be very challenging -- even more challenging than it might be for the average male.


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EzraS
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19 Dec 2017, 8:26 am

Not from what I've seen. There's been macho guys at school, but hardly a majority.



Wolfram87
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20 Dec 2017, 3:21 am

I'm a fairly masculine guy, though not a dudebro by any stretch of the imagination. That being said, compared to the aspie guys I've met (10-15 ish), I'm probably more masculine than all of them.


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20 Dec 2017, 11:54 am

The stereotype that is promo gated by the extreme male brain theory is not of the macho male(jock, frat boy) but of the nerdy/geek male.

As for myself I think the extreme male brain theory is only partially correct because I think it describes a significant sub group of Autistic people.


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20 Dec 2017, 12:05 pm

lostonearth35 wrote:
I thought autistic females were supposedly more masculine while males on the spectrum act less so.

Not in my case...


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Muziek
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20 Dec 2017, 1:30 pm

Midnightstar16 wrote:
lostonearth35 wrote:
I thought autistic females were supposedly more masculine while males on the spectrum act less so.

Not in my case...


Like Star, neither in my case...


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06 Feb 2019, 6:37 am

No , To be a man in my book you must be HONEST . To not be honest is to be a chicken sh**, one who like to cause misery. That is the furthest anyone can get to being a man . Then again it is the furthest one can get to being a woman . Answer is still No even though most NTs are not Men either. Most males are wussies . I am not politically correct I am honest ,maybe the most honest person you ever will come across. I am everything dishonest people fear and hate .



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06 Feb 2019, 7:26 am

My dad thinks he is but what he means is that he's 100% straight, doesn't wear dresses and likes picking fights...

In my experience, both extremely feminine and extremely masculine people are thick.

I mean...

feminine = shopping, makeup, beauty, doing housework for other people
masculine = fighting, drinking beer til your brain cells die, (the one part of this which is me - obsession with tribal loyalties), hating anything which isn't traditional

These are extremes btw. The rest of us are just getting on with life.

I think aspie men are in some ways more masculine than other men which is why I put my gender down as my sex on here despite having nothing in common with feminine people. There are positive masculine traits which a lot of aspie men have but most aspies are also dyspraxic and this makes them bad at sport and fighting and they don't tend to care about the tribe enough for that stuff either.



lostonearth35
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10 Mar 2019, 12:14 pm

Why do people think being masculine is the same as being violent and doing stupid, dangerous things just for the heck of it? Seriously, I recently saw a Superbowl commercial where two guys try to prove that they are masculine by drinking antifreeze and other things that should have killed them. What is up with that? 8O

Neither my dad or my brother do these stupid things. My brother does most of the cooking, his wife didn't even have a stove or an oven in her home when they first met, and she had two small daughters! My dad actually helps my mother with the housework, and my mother once proudly told me that my dad is one of the most desirable men around because other women's husbands don't bother with such things. I consider my dad and my brother *real* men because of this.



Zack1994
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10 Mar 2019, 12:58 pm

Nope, if I was very masculine I would be a lot different than I am now. I wish I was more masculine though.



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02 Jun 2019, 10:44 pm

I think autistic guys might end up more manly, in the vintage definition of it--gentlemen. (And not the Eliot Rodgers definition of gentlemen, but the Cardinal Newman definition!)

So that's cool. For a skinny little celibate man who doesn't like hanging out, who wears big glasses and dowdy outdated clothes, who drives an old outdated car and hasn't much conception of pop culture after the Swing Era, who hasn't watched a talking picture in a long time and all that, I sure do end up with girls all over me most of the time. They don't care that I would rather learn sewing machines than play with tactical firearms (but the 1900s Remington double-barrel stays) and they don't care that I go to church and pray in the quiet rather than wage beer-filled wars around a burn pit after the ball game. And because I drive a 20-odd year old Toyota rather than a Dodge Charger or something extreme, they don't think I'm a wuss. They think I'm an awesome mechanic.

So fellow Manly Men unite!


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