Callista wrote:
Yeah... that's actually a small minority of the autism spectrum.
Not really. It's about 1/3 who are severe, and will need a lot of care and support. The small minority is nonverbal adults (which is around 18%).
The other two-thirds aren't exactly "mild" by anyone's standards. People don't realize that most people with Asperger's don't work, they live at home, and they have few or no friends (the rate of college attendance is far below that of the normal population too). Those with HFA have no friends (barring outliers), they don't work (again, outliers), and they live at home or in government facilities (in other words, HFA has a little worst outcome after school).
If you have Asperger's, you have a form of autism, and it was even called "Autistic Psychopathy" to refer to the disorder, and "autist" to refer to the individual, by Hans Asperger himself.