Do most people even know what AS is?

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I had an interesting exchange with a coworker today. She was describing a girl who lives in her (tiny) town and all the problems she has and how my coworker is sure she has Asperger's syndrome. It didn't sound much like Asperger's to me, so I asked her to explain, and she said people with Asperger's are all seriously messed up, really mentally slow, have grandiose delusions, and are "not all there." She said some other things too that were not at all characteristic of AS/ASD, and when I tried to explain things to her (she doesn't know I'm on the spectrum), she basically just told me I don't know what I'm talking about and that she's sure.

Obviously the above was not enjoyable for me, but it got me wondering how common people like her are, if there really is this much of a stigma and ignorance/misunderstanding as to what AS/ASD is and what it may or may not look like. Anyone have some anecdotes? Hopefully most people aren't this poorly educated on AS/ASD.

See my thread about heading towards a crisis, it has some anecdotes.

Although I'm not AS, I'm classic autism.

I think if you haven't got a family member or friend who has ASD then your knowledge of the subject would be very limited and your preconceptions would come from TV or Film. 2 months ago I was in the same boat.

I get a sense that most people not directly involved with ASD issues think of Aspies/Autistics as bieng so impaired as to need 24/7 maintainance or socially ackward geniuses or think of the whole thing as a fake disease made up to enrich doctors and further spoil special snowflakes.

I think people conflate Aspergers with 'Classic' Autism. My mom is one of these people who won't take my suggestion that I might have mild Aspergers.

I have seen a psychologist who thinks I do have very mild Aspergers, but I'm not going to discuss it with my mom because it's a waste of time.

I think part of the problem is that some of the AS traits/symptoms can sound very general and therefore they aren't taken seriously. E.g. if I say that I find new situations very difficult, the NT person I'm speaking to will say 'everybody does, I get nervous when I try new things'. It's the intensity of the symptom that is hard to translate; to them 'difficult' might mean a few nerves, to me it means my brain switches off or goes haywire and I am unable to function.

Sometimes this difficulty in communicating intensity makes people cynical about the validity of AS as a condition. Sometimes they think that you can get over it or fix it because they have overcome a similar obstacle in the past. In all it's very hard to help the casual NT observer understand/appreciate that you're wired differently; you can work on it but you can't fix it (as I was trying to explain to someone recently, to no avail ).

My mum thinks autism is either very severe or very mild. I am moderate functioning. I need a lot of supervision but I am very intelligent. She can't see the continuum.

From experience I would say most don't and if they do then it isn't taken very serious

it's not information I volunteer

To meet anyone with the word "Asperger's" in their vocabulary at all is rare -whether they understand what it means or not.

HELL....meeting a professional psychologist who had ever heard of aspergers was rare before 2010 (16 years after it had been in the DSM). That's how dumb most therapists are!

Autism is at least something in the popular lexicon of most folks including lay people. Though folks vary in how much they understand autism.

So I am amazed that the lady in the original post even knew the word. Asking her to understand what the word actually meant is asking a lot (unfortunately).

I don't think most know. I'm sure if they filmed one of those street interviews asking random people what they knew about AS or autism in general, there would be all kinds of silly to crazy responses.

At least in the US, People tend to believe that autistic people stand in a corner and spin objects all day. Or they run around and make funny sounds. Rain Man is an exceedingly high-functioning autistic person to these people.

This is slowly changing, though, as more and more people meet families with autistic children of varying functioning levels. Or they watch the occasional news report about it.

Asperger's, if known, reminds people of characters like Sheldon in "Big Bang Theory." The stereotype would have been called "eggheads" in the 1950s/1960s. There is also the stereotype of the basement-dweller adult who is isolated socially, is angry at the world, and who might hack computer systems for fun, or perhaps seek to take physical revenge upon bullies.

From my own experience, most people I know know very little about Asperger's and the whole Autism spectrum. I had one friend in the past who had never even heard the term. I think a lot of people don't realize that it is, according to my neighbor who works in a special needs preschool, "A diagnosis a mile wide". My diagnosis is High-Functioning Autism, and a lot of people I meet don't know what that is. I try my best to educate them and my mother participates in a group that helps educate people about the Autism spectrum. There is definitely a stigma, I've noticed and I really hope that not all people are as narrow-minded as some of the people I have encountered and that my mom knows.

When my husband first heard of AS, he went to his online friend and asked what it was because he wanted to be sure I wouldn't be chasing him with a knife.

Ironically four years later, that actually happened in Chicago but it wasn't me.

Most of the people I know have no clue what AS is.