AS and Personality Types.
28 Mar 2010, 7:03 pm
Aperger's Syndrome and Personality Types.
Since very early on in my experience as a person diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome I have been convinced that Asperger's Syndrome is a personality type more than anything else.
If I am right about this, it should be possible to derive some facts to back up my thesis, and this has been a problem for me, because I have no tools to make research, nor any education or title that might aid me in such a project. So I was delighted when I earlier this evening found a poll about the Myers/Briggs Personality Test (which is a test based on work by Jung).
Even more so was I happy to find that people with Asperger's Syndrome not only seem to share certain traits, which would be more than understandable; we even seem to share the same personality type (generally speaking, of course).
The personality type we have most in common is the INTJ type, which was shared by no less than 34% of the voters!! Now this is not an insignificant number by any means, and what it does more than anything is show that we really do tend towards certain traits in personality. This is a fact even when we take into account things such as 'Who are likely to take a personality test in the first place', 'who will come across such a test = who uses the internet and seeks out an AS forum', etc. etc.. The arrows remains pointed towards what I'm claiming (and I soon learned, a couple of years back, that I'm not a lonely lunatic as to what I think in this regard).
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As a side note it is a little bit funny to think of how I first reacted when I saw I too belong to the largest group at WrongPlanet.com. I didn't believe what I saw, because I'm so used to be rare lingering at the border of nob-existent, so it was quite a jump from there to being one of the 'norm'. Lol.
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What I like about the whole thing is, that more than most other things that can - and will - be said, the massive recurrence of the same personality type only adds to the likelihood that I am right when I say that Asperger's Syndrome is not a "syndrome" in the traditional sense of that word. It is a Personality Type!
Yes, we may be (I believe we ARE) autists in some sense and to a certain degree (then again which no doubt is different for each of us. And I was diagnosed with autism as a small child). But my claim in this regard is that autism is a trait on a scale which is part of every human being's personal make-up. It's not a question wether or not austism exists in all human beings (it does), only if it exists to such an extent as to make itself noticed and/or to represent a problem (to the person themself or/and to their surroundings).
This is the same for f.ex. fundamental Mood Level. Everybody has a tendency towards a certain mood level, but raise this to one or two opposing extremes, and we have bipolar disorder.
However, being an individual with unusually highs and lows in mood doesn't in itself make them ill or sick or even having a syndrome.
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Of course, give or take ten years and it will mean that. But that's tendency of our time to put everything into boxes of precise definitions with very small margins. And these margins are getting smaller as we speak, just as more definitions are being made.
And THAT is a very common trait in a culture which is in decline, losing it's spiritual foundation. It has to invent commonalities and list them in tight order so as to make them become real.
When reality begins to slip away, we begin to discuss it and define it.
And when we define something as being "fact" or "reality", we define all the rest as unreal ... or as belonging to unwanted reality. Unwanted reality is usually what isn't easily controlled or what doesn't actively aid in upholding a steadily weaker status quo.
We can discuss what a weak status quo is, but that falls outside of this topic.
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All the above said there is no doubt that we are having genuine difficulties in our lives and many of us are in fact what can rightly be termed disabled - or have become disabled. And it should be understood that I am no advocating for us not being treated as a group of people who do need some special status. We do.
What I am saying though is that this is the case not because we're inherently sick or ill or lacking in some way, but because our culture have grown into a "phase" that produces groups like ours because of it's narrow sense of norm and usefulness and all the other values. - This is something we can't change at this stage. It would be stupid to think we could. - Sure, over time ... over a period of a couple of hundred years from now, at the very least, we may be able to change things (we better!). But at present we'll have to work with what we've got. And we've got a culture that has build into it's post-cultural structure such a set of norm values that makes it very hard to function and thrive as a person belonging to the personality type called Asperger's Syndrome. And that is why we shouldn't confuse the understanding of ourselves as being a personality variant, and ourselves as being a group in society that can't avoid becoming stigmatized and in need of aid in various ways.
Some might say: "But why even bother talking about wether we're a personality type or a syndrome or whatever? We won't change no matter what we're called".
Actually, that's not true. We will change according to how we're being interpreted by ourselves and by others. And nothing forms a perception of something more than the words used to name or phrase it.
Still, my reason to find it important that we understand ourselves, is that the more we understand, the more we will know what to do to help ourselves. The more we will know what we can do to be of good to our contemporaries and to the world as such. I can't emphasize enough how much difference it has made to me to know about Asperger's and that I am a person who has Asperger's. Not least can I see what it WOULD have meant top me if I had known earlier. In so many ways my life has been wasted, and that angers me because I feel I could have done a lot of good.
We WILL be the ones who will help us more than any other group. Neurological and other Research, Law or Medicine or Citizen's Rights, ... all of their help will always come after that of our own, especially in the future.
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It would be great to hear a few views on the issue on Asperger's Syndrome as a Syndrome, Disorder, or a Personality Type ... or as something else again. I'm eager to learn more about it all and to hear what people ... especially, perhaps, ourselves (aspies), think about it all. But NT'ers are very welcome to voice your opinions as well; I'd love to have a chance to debate it with both groups, as quite frankly, I don't have much of a chance to do that where I come from.
Thank you all in advance.
^L^,
Puzelle.
