Tyri0n wrote:
Where does the 10-15% figure come from? I think you are maybe the second person here who has gotten above average, and the other poster was convinced she had autism as a kid and grew out of it.
Anyway, if I actually cared about people, I might be above average too. I got 32 answering all the questions through an "I hate people" prism.
It depends on the type of test. Some have shown it at 8%, others 12%, apart from the original 10 and 15. It seems to depend on exactly what is being tested. Some score quite high on compassion, but very low on the socially appropriate short or long term rationalizing selfishness than often acts as what NT's call empathy. Or sometimes it's the other way around, but sice we are less inclined to do social interaction or don't know how to do it appropriately, we often score lower anyway.
Two studies one in Australia and the other UK in which variables were accounted for carefully showed that. The Australian one was 2008 but not available to the public, I have access to it through work. I can't recall when the UK one was done. And the other one, the first major study done solely on women with AS showed women are more likely than males with AS to end up as part of that 10% or so (I'll use the lower one for now).
I'm not the only one here with a high score, other posters have posted quite high scores in the past too - marshall (but it was a while ago, not this time), theaspiemusician, slowmutant, earthmonkey, sora and cockneyrebel to name a few. At least 20 others scoring within average range. And that's just from memory, I'm sure there's more. I have seen a few with scores higher than mine.
I think I'm higher in socially appropriate and low in compassion but not high on either. Not that I mean others ill all the time, but I'm usually too preoccupied with my own problems and sensory overload to feel much affinity for others unless they are very similar to me. I just don't feel like I'm the same species as most people. Other people just seem too foreign for empathy except in the most mechanical sense.
17 Apr 2013, 12:19 am
