Article: Are Aspergers and High Functioning Autism the Same?

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I agree that the idea of regression at 2 is silly but the observed effects could lead one to that conclusion.

eg: A baby is autistic from birth.

0-6 months.
Lie there. Do nothing but eat, poo, cry, move arms, kick legs, roll eyes.
Anyone could do that... autistic or otherwise.

I think the idea of regression at 2 simply means that the baby/toddler was keeping up with his peers (the other children in the "mother's group" until about 18 months... then the parents start to notice things and gradually their concerns get stronger until they're ready to take their child to a pediatrician.

If you think about it. Two is about the age where you expect a bit of talking, lots of walking and a certain amount of independent thought.

I dont think they actually "regress", they simply fail to keep the pace.

I feel completely different to someone with HFA.

The differences are most evident starting at two, yeah. Before then, it's usually, "Well, if we had known then, it would have been obvious," but it's interpreted as "colicky" or "a quiet baby" or "doesn't really like to be held" or "totally fascinated with the crib mobile" or whatever. Without the speech delay it can be passed off as "an odd, introverted child" or "a spoiled brat" or even "gifted" until the social demands of preschool or kindergarten make it obvious; but then it's been there all along too.

The regression thing happens, but it doesn't usually; and anyway, kids who lose skills when some developmental step or severe illness puts a lot of pressure on them were usually autistic to begin with--just not as obviously so.

Yes. I've noticed only a few differences. People diagnosed HFA tend to be more "obvious" and have a little more toruble in social situations.

Does anyone else find it strange that those with traditional autism have trouble with verbal ability and are often very adept at visual-spatial tasks such as drawing, while aspies often excel verbally and commonly have non-verbal learning disability (includes lack of visual-spatial skills)?

Although both groups have difficulty with social interaction, it seems their cognitive profiles are opposite in some respects.

Anyone have an explanation?


On the subjects of HFA vs. AS, those with HFA have cognitive profiles similar to those with traditional autism (low VIQ v. high PIQ and speech delay) but have normal intelligence. Those with AS have no speech delay and are often very verbal.

Linguistically, an autistic person can be described as high functioning if they have normal or above normal IQ. HFA is used to desribe a specific diagnoses. Therefore, a person with AS can be desribed as a high functioning person with an autistic-spectrum disorder, but not as a high functioning autistic.

Temple Grandin considers herself HFA but not AS.

Last edited by Master_Shake on 02 Mar 2009, 5:33 pm, edited 2 times in total.

i am AS dx'ed with excellent visual-spatial skills when it comes to drawing. also excellent verbal skills.
i am not sure about what you are saying.

Here is a good article anout AS vs. NLD: http://www.nldontheweb.org/Dinklage_1.htm



From what I have seen on these boards, many people with AS say they have good visual-spatial skills. It doesn't seem to match up with the literature that says many aspies have NLD. I wonder what the explaination is.

I think they are very similar, but I'm not sure if they are exactly the same.

Some experts say that, once they reach a certain age, those with HFA are indistinguishable from Aspies. While this may be true, the fact that those with HFA have a speech delay in childhood and tend to have higher PIQ than VIQ (the opposite of most Aspies) tells me that they're not the same. I'm tired of the neuroscience community testing HFA individuals and Aspies together in ASD studies. Obviously, their brains differ in SOME way to give these conflicting symptoms, and while treatment for both may be the same, research studies should be focusing on how the brains differ between the two. This, in my opinon, is why there is such an incredibly high amount of conflicting results in the ASD literature. I'm glad the article mentioned something along these lines. As a sidenote, I disagree that AS occurs at age 3. I demonstrated blatant AS symptoms at 18 months of age. While it may be age 3 for some, I think the beginning of the disorder is earlier for most.
-OddDuckNash99-

Of note, the outcome studies seem to offer conflicting, but often times similar results [for those that support the same conclusion].

HFA tends to be a little more severe in outcome by some studies, but not in others.

See these two (these are two of many, and both have different conclusions):
Outcome research in Asperger's syndrome and autism
Adult outcomes in individuals with High-Functioning Autism and Asperger's Syndrome

Of note again, HFA is in the DSM-IV-TR; it's just a straight diagnosis of Autistic Disorder on Axis-I (if there's associated Mental Retardation, they code that on another Axis).

I'll post the relevant quotes from the first one (as it's long),
HFA:

AS:


and the second one:

The problem with talking about how AS has better outcomes, is that doctors will diagnose you AS if you look higher functioning and Autistic if you look lower functioning; and then obviously when you look at those two groups one will have better outcomes than the other on average. The whole thing's circular--AS has better outcomes because people are diagnosed AS if they look likely to have better outcomes....

Yup. Autism naturally causes the brain to specialize, making really odd skill patterns. Those with higher verbal skills are more likely to learn to speak on time, and so are called Asperger's. Those with higher visual skills will concentrate on those, have a speech delay, and be called Autistic.

Ah, but if those who look "lower-functioning" had a delay in the acquisition of speech compared to the those who don't, and are labelled AS in the study, it's relevant. This is in the context of clinical studies, rather than individual diagnoses.

But anyway, as you can see above, even in the one that says HFA is more severe, AS isn't too far behind.

oh thanks. i will check it out tonight.

No? I thought AS describes people with normal speech development while HFA means people, without normal speech development, still possesses a high IQ of over 90?

I think it's all a bit of a joke really. Humans like labelling things and if they've got two labels they REALLY REALLY REALLY LIKE then they're going to try and find as much evidence to support keeping both.

http://www.mugsy.org/wing2.htm - I'm sure I've posted/read this before, but just thought I'd revive it. I'm not criticising the writer, but she IS reporting some pretty dodgy justifications for keeping the two diagnoses separate, and I'm not very impressed with their reasoning.

"Let's keep it separate so people can believe their diagnosis better (succumb to the stereotype and make another label instead of educating people more)"

"It's completely inconclusive so we'll say both sides and make it sound like it's significant"


"Let's use non-polar opposites and non-exclusive traits to make our points."
(so Aspies characteristically "reverse pronouns" eh? Never mind that even classic autistics can do that too. Comprehension? I would assume at the very LEAST that individuals with LFA would also have problems understanding complex meanings. this paragraph says almost nothing about how the two differ.)

"When we're contrasting the two, let's use "may be"s and "tend to be"s for both diagnoses just in case the exact opposite happens, in which case never mind."


"Let's use only specific examples of X Y and Z ASD people instead of admitting that we actually don't have enough research to make the kind of generalisations we're making."


"You only have sensory problems as AS if you're MR."
(anyone else find that offensive?)

I'm provisionally AS but the results are screwed up by also having anxiety. (increase anxiety, reduce autistic traits. decrease anxiety, increase autistic traits). if I were completely honest about my actual functioning I would probably be flexibly HFA. I'm a bit cynical and don't believe in AS.

But apparently I've got it.

I'd rather echo Callista from some other goodness knows what thread and say we're all autistic, let's move on.

I do believe autism varies between people, and I know people are varied. I view this as a very significant barrier to being certain whether we are observing (in a particular instance) a difference of autism, or a difference in individual responses to a particular autistic trait.
This sums up the basic premise better than I can:

With or without autism, some people are language orientated, and some are not, some people are visually gifted but not all are. I cannot see why these differences would not exist in autistic people, and I cannot see how autism would not express differently as a result of these underlying differences.


Indeed. But is this necessarily because of differences in autism only, or differences in the utility/necessity and effect of (acquiring) particular skills?

If communication is central to much of human learning, and someone impaired in non-verbal communication is also impaired in verbal communication, we would predict this as having significant impacts on learning and therefore independence and functioning. It is probably true that communication is central to much of human learning.

We might also expect that perhaps learning language might in itself have physical impacts on brains, such that we would expect to see differences in function/independence between non-autistic people who have not learned at least one language and non-autistic people who have. I see no reason to not predict the same of autistic people.

Liresse has demonstrated the weakness of an argument used to substantiate the utility/purpose/rationality of the division, and I have yet to find a comprehensive evidence based argument that demonstrates we currently have the knowledge to know what the distinction reflects/represents.