Which Asperger's stereotypes do you not exhibit?

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I'm not Aspergean as far as liking structured activities and having superior intelligence is concerned. I'm also not verbose and don't go into lengthy monologues about the subjects that interest me.

My son and I both have the same problem. Almost too high functioning to be labeled AS. We both have friends. It's only when you start looking and see that I have the same friends that I had 20 years ago, that makes you go, hmmmmmm. Not many new friends. Have a horrible time on jobs because I'm always labeled anti social.

I've learned to let SOME people touch me. I don't mind some kinds of parties. I'm not an exceptional artist. I'm extremely verbal. I let my food touch other food sometimes. But then you learn about my extreme don't eat or drink after anyone else rule.

I don't rock unconsciously but find rocking in general extremely calming and wonderful. I don't seem obsessed until you learn that I know everything about every serial killer in the universe and I know way more about the Roswell incident than any human being should know.

I just come across as extremely quirky and odd. So people think that I don't have the extreme social awkwardness because I live in this little bubble. My whole worl is accommodations and modifications built specifically to make my world a better place to be in.

...I lack rigid routines and superior intelligence..and I am not picky about my food.

....I guess the Aspie stereotypes I can think of are the "Computer Programmer""Math Genius" stereotypes.....

I am mathematicly dysfunctional and ill educated...

My "Aspieness" mainly lies in my social problems, certain senory issues, motor coordination, odd voice and gait, narrow interests, lack of eye contact, tendancy to stim, and get caught up in OCD behaviour, childlike-ness...and a few other things.

Where I hail from, lacking eye contact (not a complete absence of), speaking without inflection and droning on about your special interest in social settings/saying [socially] inappropriate things is the stereotype of AS.

I don't wish to share my interest with anyone, so I don't talk about it, nor do I socialize out there (I don't wish to either); I know I say socially inappropriate things that may hurt others, I don't intend to hurt them, but the effect is still the same (this is on the 'net).

I don't have the computer nerd thingy, nor the mathematical genius/highly educated one (I don't know where the last one comes from as high school is the highest level of education most with AS achieve).

Have to agree with the math/computer genius thing. I am very artistic, but math is a struggle. I don't have rigid routines, either, though I have flexible ones (?!?). I have slightly higher education (AAS degree), but that was pure necessity. Don't blurt out hurtful things or drone on (much) about my interests, but this is because part of me defense mechanism against the world is to not talk very much at all and use my size and unusual mannerisms to intimidate casual onlookers.

A Stereotopic Typic! OOps. Another forum (Easy to let the creative flow carry me away) Sorry

Face blindness. I can recognize famous faces of historical characters but I often cannot recognize my son's friends (there are too many of them and they all look like his clones). My daughter has few friends and they are all sufficiently different and so are easier to sort out (different skin colours and hair colours and styles, etc.)

I do not know if this helps.

I'm the same way and being able to accept or handle change depends on how depressed i am.



I don't fit either of these stereotypes. My dad and another person from jr. high who stole one of my paintings thought i was pretty good at art but i never stuck with it.

School wasn't hard for me.
I played a lot of sports as a kid so i have no problem motor coordination.
I don't think i suffer from OCD.
I was never considered a little professor(the main reason why im still unsure if i have it)
I've had many interests and tried many different sports throughout my life, the two interests that have stuck with me since i was little are comedy and music but i don't have an overwhelming need to know everything about them. I do have a third interest that will stick with me the rest of my life, surveying.
I don't have trouble getting a job.

My main problem lies in making and keeping friends and finding a girlfriend.
I think to most people i just come off as shy.
Ive learned so much from this site about friendship etc, which im thankful for.

I don't exhibit literal thinking.

My social skills have improved greatly over the years. I am still uncomfortable in crowds, but I do well one on one.

I am only average in math and am not a computer expert.

Those that I do exhibit:

* "Little professor"
* Completely obsessive about my current interest (usually for several months at a time, maybe for several years)
* Ramble continually about my interests and will either direct the conversation towards them all the time, or refrain from doing this but still want to
* Verbose (used to be verbose in speech as a child, became really awkward in speech but verbose in writing as a teen; still occasionally become overly verbose in speech when in a cheerful mood and/or excited about something)
* Advanced vocabulary and "innate literacy" (but will make the strangest typos if I don't check what I am writing, not because I don't know the rules of grammar/spelling, but because my mind seems to work in an odd way)
* Linguistic abilities
* Artistic (but without any superior drawing skills; actually, my technical drawing skills are virtually nonexistent, though the ideas are there)
* Think in pictures (but not like Temple Grandin does)
* Odd voice prosody and speech patterns
* Animal-lover, get along with animals better than with many people
* Bluntness alternating with excessive political correctness and apologies all over the place (two sides of the same coin)
* Hyper-focus to the point of forgetting to eat, change clothes and do other essential things, can be so absorbed in what I am doing that I will eat whatever and dress in a fairly sloppy and simplistic way; in the long term, workaholic
* Good rote/visual memory (but not superb, savant-like eidetic memory)

Those that I do not exhibit:

* Computer nerd, or, for that matter, any "nerd"
* Math genius (I'm mathematically challenged, and I'm far from any sort of "genius")
* Superior intelligence (see above)
* Emotionless or lacking empathy (I do sometimes feel completely flat at times when one isn't expected to, but in many cases it could come from depression; otherwise, I usually pick up people's feelings and absorb them too easily)
* Strict adherence to routines and schedules and being frightened or anxious when they are broken (but I do need routines and schedules badly in order to be efficient at anything, and I enjoy them, when I do manage to construct them)
* No friends (I have several people who are very close to me and I'm quite satisfied with that, though I may have a fair amount of trouble approaching unfamiliar people, and, as a result, practically don't have casual friends or acquaintances)
* Literal thinking, not understanding metaphor (metaphor is frequently the only way I can understand certain more complex emotions, and my thinking is quite metaphorical in itself; however, I used to have no sense of humor and still occasionally have difficulties with it, or reply to rhetorical questions)
* Voice odd (broken, fading or overly slow sing-song pattern etc.) rather than monotonous in the strict sense
* Can easily look at people whom I like and/or have known for a long time

Last edited by ixochiyo_yohuallan on 29 Dec 2007, 1:48 pm, edited 3 times in total.

Ah, I forgot the "little professor" stereotype, that's like the ultimate one too.

I suppose I fit it when I speak of my interest, which has only been on the 'net a few times
I also fit the uncaring, cold, distant, emotionless robot that lacks empathy
I have one friend (they usually say more than a few "counts")
I'm good with children and animals

I'm not verbose; in fact, I rarely talk at all; so I don't fit the "aspie" stereotype of a verbose individual

I was more like a "little professor" when I was little.

Now I am not like a professor at all.

I don't fit the stereotype of having...

*Superior intellegence. [my IQ is 108...average].
*Rigid routines. [I do have some routine but most of it consists of my physically surroundings and things there being in "order"].
*Being "destructive" or "hyper". [I don't have ADD or ADHD as a comormid with AS]

Out of things others here have listed(That I agree are part of the stereotype), where I DON'T match the supposed AS stereotype:

1. I don't like structured activities
2. I am not fantastic with math
3. I don't have a TOTAL lack of eye contact.
4. I have voice inflection.
5. I speak of interests only when appropriate. Of course, some OTHERS sometimes don't think it is appropriate.
6. I NOW practically bite my tounge to prevent blunt speech, etc...
7. I am not artistic.
8. My routines aren't THAT rigid.
9. I don't think I have the same kind of visual memory people here speak of, and it isn't eidetic.

BTW Daniel, it is IMPOSSIBLE to only be able to learn in college. If you could only learn there, there would be nothing to learn because they wouldn't exist because they didn't! In otherwords, it is circular reasoning because the first college had to have people that DIDN'T learn in college. Anyway, I am mostly autodidactic.

Some of the stereotypes you and another mentioned here run counter to the DSM.

I don't exhibit the dislike of bright/flourescent lights stereotype.

I'm not the geeky engineer type. I'm the artistic, liberal arts type.

The face blindness thing. If I've seen ppl before, I will recognise their face (albeit not completely. I usually think "I've seen them before"). I don't ever remember their names though