A little confused:

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My granddaughter was diagnosed with ASD several years ago, and my son mentioned once how he related to so many of the symptoms himself. So, thinking back to my school days; numerous fights and plenty of ostracism, as well as many 'disconnects' in adult life, I undertook several on-line quizzes, including AS Quotient, Aspi Quiz and RAADS. All of the indicated that I am likely on the ASD spectrum.

Now, as a senior, I like to engage in a few on-line puzzle games hoping they will help keep my mind sharp. Wordle and Canuckle are word games, which I enjoy, and manage to do quite well at. Nerdle is a math game, and it hasn't stumped me yet, but I also play a few 'pattern recognition' games, all of which I am very average - AT BEST - at doing.

Perhaps I have stereotyped, but I understood one significant symptom of ASD was a high aptitude for pattern recognition. Can an autistic person be at or even below average at pattern recognition? Or have my quiz scores pointed me in the wrong direction?

Temple Grandin:

I have observed that there are three different specialized autistic/Asperger cognitive types. They are:

(1) Visual thinkers such as I, who are often poor at algebra. (2) Verbal specialists who are good at talking and writing but they lack visual skills. (3) Pattern thinkers such as Daniel Tammet, who excel in math and music but may have problems with reading or writing composition

You know the line:

If you meet one autistic person, you've met one autistic person.

Specifics like that are not deal-breakers. You'd need a professional evaluation to know for certain.

Welcome to WP!!

We all have different strengths and weaknesses just like any other diverse community. Welcome to WP

I'm 53, and I didn't know I was on the spectrum until my 40's despite the rather glaring symptoms. Then it was "Oh, you didn't know? Well, hate to break it to you buddy, but ..."

There are a lot of generalizations about ASD and not a lot of reliably general people on that spectrum. If there were one cognitive symptom that I would suggest is more common than any other it is our tendency to excel at whatever we hyper-focus our attention on. The characteristic is that focus ...

... but it might be a focus on Star Wars figures, music, dinosaurs, code, quantum physics, or anything else.

In my personal opinion, I believe that pattern recognition is a side-effect of that focus. When I give something, anything, so much attention over a period of time, anything even slightly anomalous or repetitive leaps out at me and shouts in my face cognitively speaking.

Thank you all for the responses. I must admit that the results from the quizzes I took left me feeling both resentful, and relieved at the same time.

My initial reaction was one of: "Why me? - Some atypical gene finds its way into my makeup, and puts me through all kinds of anguish, and derails my life time and time again! - It's not fair!" But, then again I could have had MD, ALS - or any other of a host of debilitating diseases. And I did not; so maybe I'm the lucky one. I also think that since each time life knocked me down, I got back up more determined than ever; carving out a pretty good career, and growing a wonderful family. So, then I look back and think "OMG ... that explains so much! Now my life makes so much more sense. - There is nothing wrong with me. I'm just different." So, I take comfort in that.

At 73, I don't think there would be any benefit in my going through the process of diagnosis. Your responses have helped, and I'm content just knowing who I am and how I got to where I am - knowing that various obstacles that seemed to be thrown in front of me were real, and that I was able to overcome them. Thanks again!

I could be wrong here, but my impression was that the really high pattern recognition abilities tend to go more with classic autism, perhaps as a kind of alternative developmental pathway of the brain away from language learning.

WELCOME TO WP just by the way......i have pattern revognition, but I have ye to figure out best to apply it, It just is...
never know whats going to get called up and associated...but when it does seemingly ,repeated , My brain can connect the dots , as to how things fit together..Not something , I try at ..it just is ..? . Is there such a thing as Sporadic pattern recognition.?