Asperger's and "extreme male brain"

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I have been reading that people with Asperger's Syndrome are often described as having an extreme male brain type of thinking, particularly when it comes to problem solving. Would anyone here agree or disagree that, despite this, they seem to typically have less male swagger and bluster?

source?

"The impression that there are far more boys with autism than girls, and that this is even more striking in Asperger syndrome, has not changed much in the years since. Recent studies continue to show that the ratio of boys to girls with autism is about 4 or 5 to 1, 6 7 while the ratio of boys to girls with Asperger's syndrome is between 6 and 11 to 1. 8 9
What no one has been able to discover yet is why.
Autistic Traits: Male Plus?
It is not just that there are more boys than girls with ASDs. Researchers have also noticed that there is something "male and then some" about the way individuals with ASD think, act, and cope. Asperger himself speculated that the characteristics he saw in his young patients could represent an "extreme variant of male intelligence.""

The forum will not let me post URLs yet, so I can't post the link.

Additionally, many of the articles I have read state that it is common for people with Asperger's Syndrome to struggle with self confidence and social skills. Here is a quote from another article:

"Asperger's syndrome is a developmental disorder that makes it very hard to interact with other people. Your child may find it hard to make friends because he or she is socially awkward."

People with Asperger's Syndrome are not known for being the life of the party or being prone to wow the crowd. I'm not saying this is good or bad, simply making an observation and was curious as to what viewpoints others may have on the subject. There can be advantages to being able to exert influence over others, except there's nothing wrong with preferring smaller crowds.

We can't separate AS from hormonal influences, but using "male" as a primary description invites all the confusion generated by those who are politically motivated.

This is my experience and I didn't understand I was Autistic until 3 months ago....I am 46.
I struggle with self confidence, social skills, having "real" friends, and being socially awkward. When I was 16-25ish, I used alcohol to mask the issues. I was the life of the party and to wowed crowd, but it wasn't who I was, it was the alcohol. I was doing what others considered "crazy things", but didn't really strike me as such. I didn't understand how to act so I emulated what a "guy" was and used behaviors learned from people around me. By becoming "numb" I let go of how uncomfortable I always was. It was exhausting being the center of attention and required more and more self-destructive (drinking to excess) behavior to keep up the ruse. I have the life experience and learned behaviors (ones that I remember) and I'm still learning through trial and error which ones are acceptable. Finding out who I am and why is a bit of a surprise to people who knew me then. I believe alcohol and my ability to problem solve was used to mask the awkwardness I felt growing up. Things learned were not always socially acceptable and that's definitely caused me problems. Although it's also helped me to date, interact when required, and better understand the effects of alcohol and it's uses in social settings. As far as less male swagger and bluster, I used swagger and bluster to hide my insecurities. The reality is it didn't work for s**t I just looked like an a**h**e most of the time.
That's my .02

I think that that was just some passing thought some writer had. "Gee whiz... all of the traits that autistics/aspies have that distinguish them from NTs are the same traits the distinquish men from women: more logical, less emotional, more self centered, less people oriented, more thing oriented, less empathy, etc.. Ergo aspies must have brains that are more 'male' than even male NT brains".

It became a fad to spout that a few years ago. And then it disappeared. Disappeared for good reason. Its just doesn't work as a model. It aint so.Its like the claim that " all cats have aspergers and all dogs are NTs, and that small dogs have ADHD". At best its only true in a poetic metaphoric way. Never read nor heard about any real evidence, like from CAT scans of human brains for example, that show that aspies have hypermale brains.

But folks on WP see it written somewhere, and take it dead seriously and post worried queries about it like this one even now... years after Ive stopped seeing it in the media.

That's weird. I read about it all the time. Thought there were something to it until I came to WP.
I want to remember reading about it in English, but it might as well have been in Danish. Anyway, the idea is still circulating in some places.

I dunno.

I don't run across it. And if it is still being circulated it doesn't seem to be being reported as being circulated in the scientific community.

I don't really buy into this theory. Besides stereotyping the genders, it also stereotypes Aspies. We can be imaginative, creative, social, empathetic, caring, etc.

The theory is the invention of one researcher: Dr. Simon Baron-Cohen.

I never understood how he'd pick a few traits associated with "maleness," but ignore others. Say, less (perceived) empathy, but not more promiscuity or territorial behavior or ??? (not sure what the scientifically determined traits of maleness are, if there are any). He did some studies involving fetal hormone levels, but I've not looked up to see if they panned out. Since the theory seems to have disappeared I suppose it didn't.

It was an attempt at a "catchy" theory that made for good newspaper headlines, IMO.

A trope I wish would die, if only due to my own personality rather than AS. I find that in order to fit in as a culturally acceptable male, I have to suppress both my emotional reactions and affective empathy. (growing up in a conformist region of an already highly conformist national culture probably doesn't help).

Turns out the latter is a difficult task as it requires application of cognitive empathy to determine when it's appropriate to show/supress affect. (at times I have felt terrible to act that way, while others likely perceived it as insensitivity, nobody wins).

If anything I feel and act less out of place in a group of mostly women than of men engaged in "blokey"/bantering behavior. Hyper-male brain? Clearly missed the memo on that one.

Find the idea extremely unscientific and mildly disturbing. Grey matter has no gender. Social constructs of gender typically involve no grey matter. Asperger's is having a brain with extremes. Irrespective of reproductive anatomy.

I agree the essence of it. But people are different too.

I remember reading about this somewhere but I forgot the source of where I read it. It basically said that while anyone can have aspergers, the girls that have it tend to have a brain that closely resembles a neurotypical male brain rather then neurotypical female brain. Of course the case of aspergers in males is different but I suppose for everyone its a bit different.

I think there's some truth to it. Well, sort of. When I'm home I do things that probably aren't considered very masculine like talk to my pets. I give my son lots of hugs and probably tell him I love him 5 times a day. I can be totally nerdy and uncool and don't care.

On the other hand, I've encountered your typical type A male who tries to boss me around, or make me bend to his will. In those cases, I have absolutely no fear and can become malevolent towards them. I sometimes wonder if I have a higher than normal effect with adrenaline or something.

Also, when somebody talks big and promises something my response will basically be, either make it happen or shut the f*ck up. You can either do it or you can't. If you said you can and you can't, than I don't want to hear from you if you fail. And mind you, I don't care who that person is, if they are freely bragging about how good they are, etc. than I want them to put their money where their mouth is. I'd be extremely verbally abusive towards Donald Trump because, frankly, he is a do nothing, talk big kind of guy. I hate that sh*t.

So I'd say that's sort of extreme. I'm not proud of the above. On the other hand, I can be very caring, understanding, and empathetic towards people who need it.

I think Simon Baron-Cohen's hypothesis is considerably more nuanced than you are implying. For example, it proposes a correlation between fetal testosterone levels during pregnancy and a tendency towards autism in the child. It is not an "A implies and is implied by B" kind of hypothesis; rather, it is a proposal that there could exist correlations of non-trivial statistical significance. Testing the hypothesis would require accumulating a lot of data, which has not yet been done. It cannot be proved overnight. Likewise, it cannot be disproved just with a quick "this doesn't sound very scientific" remark from someone who maybe hasn't read the relevant research papers.