90% aspies have normal intelligence despite what they think

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I understand where you are coming from.

This is a forum were I feel I can just throw in what I am thinking and this thread presented the opportunity.

This isn't true. It's only somewhat true. There are two things to consider when discussing such things. The first is the Dunning-Kruger effect, in which people overestimate their abilities. Usually they're not very good at it:

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/evo ... ger-effect

Mostly it's people who are bad at something who lack the ability to judge their performance and thus overestimate their abilities.

Then there is the imposter syndrome:

https://counseling.caltech.edu/general/ ... s/Impostor

People who are actually good at what they do are more likely to underestimate their skill and attribute their successes to external factors.

Personally I don't see how you can discuss the topic without asking that question, but it may just be my own limitations and thinking style ; I know I am a bit obsessed with defining things and using a precise vocabulary. Sorry if that cause an issue. I don't know if that refers to me but I am not trying to be "politically correct" (I'm not very good at it, and honestly I think it would be complete waste of time and energy here ). Just to have precise thoughts and a clear thinking.



I agree with you on that. Memorizing stuff has little to do with intelligence, whatever the way I think of it.

About "aspie intelligence", from what I understand the consensus for many people on this board is that autistic and NT intellect operate differently. Depending on the task and situation (and individual person, of course), one may work better than the other. But since most of the world is NT, we often have a hard time. I globally agree with that. Even if of course sometimes I feel really stupid, and in some less common situations it is the NT who look "disabled" to me (so easily enthralled by stupid power games).

Political correctness is something that people love to use to label and discredit a need to not label people negatively and in prejudicial and discriminatory terms as well as outright slurs. Basically, saying "I hate political correctness" is like saying "I hate compassion for other people and love the systems that grind people down." Or maybe "I like to come across like a sociopathic jerk."

I am not sure what you specifically mean by "political correctness," but the common usage is an argument in favor of abusing people based on arbitrary criteria (such as skin color, perceived intelligence, gender, sexuality, disability, etc).



Stupidity is practically meaningless. Most people who are labeled as stupid experienced a lapse in judgment for whatever reason, or they're labeled as stupid because they're in disagreement with the person labeling them as stupid. As such, with a usage that is entirely idiosyncratic, it has no purpose in a discussion about intelligence. People can do stupid things but "stupidity" as an enduring character trait is largely perceived due to cognitive bias and the fundamental attribution error.

I agree with the rest of your post, about the problematic nature of the distinctions between AS and autism as well as who sounds insightful or not. I just think that the use of the above terms is sloppy rhetoric.

Well, I don't know what you call intelligence but I do know this. From what I've read and heard from Aspies and expert psychologists/psychiatrists, many Aspies (including myself) can see solutions to problems that Neurotypicals just can't see. It's not that we're smarter or more intelligent. It's just that our brains work differently - our brains are wired differently to NTs so we can approach things from angles other people just don't see. Sometimes better. Sometimes it might take a little longer but certainly, we do have our moments of pure genius.

Personally, I've come up with solutions to tests given to our group by our psychologists that haven't even been thought of by other patients for as many years as they've been running the groups. I've heard several times from our psychologists, "No one's ever thought of doing it that way before!" or "You're the first person to do it that way!". We just think differently.

Are we more intelligent? I don't know but I do know we think differently and in that difference, there are moments of sheer genius. Of course, we also have our dumb moments as well but that's just part and parcel of being an animal

yeah sorry about that.
I think I found this when I was doing research on BBC Sherlock, it was written that portraying geniuses as aspies is harmful because actually 90% of aspies have normal intelligence. Then I started to do research on it, I think I googled "asperger normal intelligence".
but anyway, even if the source is not reliable, the discussion is still interesting. Do you think most aspies may be viewed as intelligent because of good memory and intense research on some topics when they actually have normal intelligence?

Box?? What box, we didn't know there was a box........Are there cookies in the box?

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOMUF3HKfow[/youtube]

When I read this I had a real change of perspective. My whole life I heard people saying I am very intelligent, but that's mostly because I got good grades without the need to study (good memory) and I knew answers and facts because I had a lot of knowledge (researches). Then I thought to myself: is it really intelligence?
like other users said I have good insights (and seeing solutions) sometimes, but that's probably because my brain works differently. In other situations I seem dumb.
also this overestimation of own abilities some users cited is pretty interesting.
cberg, what do you mean by intellect?
ouroborusuk,don't worry, I always think of the concepts of things too. (if you don't mind me asking, what is your mbti type? I am kind addicted about it now. Don't know if you like this classification, but...)

I am glad you guys liked the topic

Let's stop this.

Some Aspies barely function.

Others are geniuses.

Just like NTs.

I feel most Aspies feel they are as intellectually intelligent as the next person but we also know we tend to not be emotionally intelligent.

I agree with this, it sounds awesome.



I think on first meeting, people often think I am significantly dumber than I am (often assume I am quite disabled). After awhile, people then tend to think I am much more intelligent than I am. I believe this is often the result of knowing a significant amount of information/having specific insight on a few topics. Very very far from global knowledge.

Both of these cause a lot of anxiety (the latter being the worst).

My IQ as tested has been all over the map, so I deem it unreliable.



I wish people would just stop sizing each other up for intelligence. ...something we haven't even really defined all that well...

human beings are judgemental as a species thanks to the primal trait of being suspicious and fearful of those different to themselves.
its up to breeding and personality as to whether the average person grows up without that close mindedness.


have always thought the whole above average IQ thing with aspies was because aspergers has a very limited high functioning IQ allowance [can only start out of the intelectual disability=US or learning disability=UK range] whereas the NT spectrum doesnt have IQ limits,so in that way aspies of course do have higher IQs than NTs because no one with aspergers can be low functioning.
the infamous jill dando killer;barry george [supposed killer as theres a lot of flaws in the case] actualy has an IQ just one point outside of
the learning disability spectrum,had been special school educated his whole life and was still considered aspergers so high functioning is pretty wide.

there are a lot of aspies who wave high IQ scores around like theyve got nothing else to be proud about,but theres also a lot of high functioning autistics who self diagnose themselves as being intelectualy disabled because their high self awareness crosses paths with their low self esteem and struggles that have not yet been supported properly.
those of us who are intelectualy disabled actualy lack that level of self awareness and ability to compare ourselves to others plus lack ability to feel peer pressure,we might know of our weaknesses only through repetition of what others have told us but it doesnt mean anything bad or good to us.

Well, when I was 8, I was tested on the WISC-III; my verbal IQ was 100 and my performance IQ was 90, with the overall IQ being 95. My lowest score was in picture completion (a 3, which was more than 2 standard deviations (SDs) below normal) and my highest score was in block design (a 19, which was 3 SDs above normal and the only subtest on the performance IQ where I scored at or above the mean).

When I was 15, I was tested on the WISC-III again; my verbal IQ was 131 (big jump!), but my performance IQ was a measly 93, dragging down my overall IQ to 113. My lowest subtest score was in object assembly (a 7, which was 1 SD below normal) and my highest subtest score was in vocabulary (17, more than 2 SDs above normal). My block design score had dropped to a 12 (2/3 SD above normal) and was still the only performance IQ subtest at which I scored at or above the mean, but I didn't have any of the super-low scores that I had had when I was 8, which helped my IQ a lot.

Talk about uneven development, huh?

If correctly diagnosed, Asperger's required "average or above average intelligence". Not having AS does not come with any such caveat. Therefore, mathematically speaking the average intelligence of the AS population has to be higher than the average of the general population as the general population includes those with below average intelligence. Basic maths!

You've made a lot of assumptions there.

It's more like:

Some autistic people barely function.

Some function well in comparison.

Some autistic people are geniuses.

Some autistic people are not.

Being a genius or not doesn't mean you're going to function well or poorly. They're two different things.