Who introduced the "male brain" theory of autism?

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If you said Simon Baron-Cohen--you're wrong!

It was Hans Asperger himself, in Die "Autistischen Psychopathen" im Kindesalter:

That doesn't make it correct.

My post had nothing to do with whether or not it is "correct".

interesting. i didn't know.

thnx for posting.


@zen:

it is the word "male/female brain" that's troubling... but it was initially only used to indicate that the empathizing brain was typical for females and the systemizing brain was typical for men.

and there is no doubt that people on the spectrum in general are more systemizing....

It would be more nearly accurate to talk about the specifics of empathizing and systemizing without resorting to gender essentialism (or gender at all), and then it would be helpful to describe these in more detail without falling back on simplistic assumptions and observations.

Sorry. I'll just go away now. I shouldn't have gotten out of bed today.

Also, being predominately systemizing does not necassarily make one un-empathetic.

No, don't go away.



Yes.

that is correct.

this research even suggests that aspie in some cases are more empathic than their NT counterparts.... and thus the topic needs to be revisited:



but...

the point is, that in the baron-cohen test (as it is!!), the women's scores lean toward empathizing and men towards systemizing... and aspies (both men and woman) lean towards systemizing....

even enough to give it a statistic significancy.... that can rule out the option of being an aspie if one scores lower than a certain threshold.

Well, that is why it is called a theory...

I'm entertained by the right-brain-left brain agruments as well. I'm a lefthanded female (extremely right brain dominant). So much for theory...

Yes, but the point is that the leap from that to "extreme male brain" makes no sense. It simply means ASD brains instead of neurotypical brains. And it doesn't address how much of that is socialization versus neurology.

As far as the male-brain theory, it strikes me as like deciding to conceptualize a stroke in a language-critical part of the brain as "making the brain more male" -- since woman are statistically better with language (in whatever ways). Maybe it's true, kind of... in a way? -- But is it really a useful way to look at things? What does the theory add to understanding ASC's?

I'm not convinced that women are particularly empathic.

@ several people...

remember the "male/female" part doesn't originate from the baron-cohen tests!! !!

the test are designed to spot empathizing and systemizing skills.... hence the EQ and SQ name... otherwise it would be FQ (female quotient) and MQ (male quotient)

the male/female part becomes ever so slightly obvious as a result of the tests... and cannot be disputed, since it still has significant statistical value:

females tend to be more empathic, men tend to be more systemizing, and people on the spectrum even more so...

see the graphs etc. in this article for further reference:

http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/language ... 03609.html

You have already stated this information, which I doubt anyone had missed even before you'd decided to do so. Obviously they mean male and female neurotypical brains, and autistic brains do not work in quite the same way as expected. This is not a sign of a male brain any more than having a larger vocabulary is the sign of a female brain. Describing them as such is unscientific and misleading.

Also, Cohen, etc. have tried to go to much greater lengths to prove the extremely dubious "extreme male brain" theory, well beyond the empathizing/systemizing categories established with those tests. It's not simple "the graphs say that men are more likely to be systemizers and women are more likely to be empathic." Further, doesn't it strike you as even remotely dodgy to suggest that autistic people do not think like neurotypicals, and then suggest that autistic people think like neurotypical males?

@ verdandi

i am not sure why... but it seems to me that my point still doesn't get across...

cohen et al NEVER coined the "extreme male brain" theory.... they showed that woman tend to be more empathizers. men more systemizers. and people on the spectrum even more so...

why do you try to pull the male/female part into the discussion again then? it confuses me, so i feel i have to repeat myself... even though you state that i already have stated it...

to be clear once more: the link to females and males is not done by the researcher... but by the general public.

i hope i make my point more clear this time.... i can't do it any better i'm afraid.