how would you describe different functioning levels of ASD?

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jenisautistic
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29 Apr 2015, 1:50 pm

Like Aspergers high functiong mid functioning autism and low functioning autism? How would you describe the levels of severity in your own words?


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kraftiekortie
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29 Apr 2015, 1:55 pm

It's actually difficult to describe.

I think the DSM V "Levels 1, 2, and 3" describe "high, middle, and low-functioning autism" somewhat well, though it's by no means conclusive or perfect.

Many people with autism are mild in some things, moderate in others, severe in others, and non-disordered in others.

It has been stated, many times, that the separation between "high-functioning" and "low-functioning" autism is that people with an IQ over 70 have "high-functioning" autism, It's not official, by any means.

If a person cannot take care of his/her basic needs, that person is definitely "low-functioning."

If a person is able to take care of his basic needs, has functional speech, yet has severe difficulty relating to people,
then--perhaps, the person is "moderate-functioning."



cavernio
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29 Apr 2015, 2:11 pm

Welp, my theory of autism is that autistics' consciousnesses are more aware of their internal mind's workings. Like, our brains takes input in unconsciously, then integrates a huge chunk of it unconsciously, at some point in this process, consciousness becomes involved, and at that point in our brain's processing of information, that is where the mind enters. I think that autistic people's conscious minds enter sooner in the information processing stage. While this allows for having a lot more directed control over how things are processed, it also means that there is automatically MORE information that you could be conscious of. But entering into understanding sooner doesn't make one's working memory LARGER. You only have so much RAM/working memory before it's filled up, and when it's filled with parts of things, you reach a maximal capacity. The point at which a non-autistic mind enters into consciousness is after the brain has already put a lot of things into wholes, so that their mind is processing a whole which is a sum of parts which can then be related to another whole which is a sum of parts, whereas an autistic mind sees things as parts compared to wholes...comparatively speaking of course.

Using this theory I would describe more severe autistics' consciousnesses as entering much earlier in the information processing stage, and that where consciousness enters depending on which senses are involved, will show how severe the autism is. Like, our brain integrates so much information all the time, that where in particular you become conscious will be different for every process. So it's not just senses but how they integrate, understand, how memory forms and works, how the very understanding of the world around you is, is not just a 1 process thing. So one can become conscious of all of these various parts at various different points of their integrations, which is why there is such a large variety within autistics.


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