No More "Asperger's Syndrome" 602
cstacy writes "The American Psychiatric Association is dropping Asperger's Syndrome from the upcoming edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM-5) Its symptoms will be included under the umbrella of Autism Spectrum Disorder, which includes everything from severe autism such as children who do not talk or interact, to milder forms of autism. Asperger's disorder is impairment in social interaction and repetitive and stereotyped patterns of behavior, activities and interests, without significant delay in language or cognitive development. Often the person has high intelligence and vast knowledge on narrow subjects but lacks social skills. DSM-5 comes out in May and will be the first major rewrite in 19 years."
Damn... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Damn... (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not a disease.
Re:Damn... (Score:5, Funny)
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"Diseases are not the only thing that can be cured. Ham, for instance."
So there's hope for Captain Kirk?
Re:Damn... (Score:5, Informative)
>Diseases are not the only thing that can be cured. Ham, for instance.
Sorry, but the Amiga's most famous graphics mode was congenitally-screwed the moment the company's management forced Jay Miner to go back and make it RGB-based instead of hue-saturation-luminosity based. In retrospect, though, it was mostly just ahead of its time. If I could go back in time 20 years, I'd NOW implement a HAM game by rendering to a phantom 16-bit playfield (using the top bit or few to flag 'dirty' bitmap areas that changed), then use something like the painter algorithm to re-render chunks of it that virtual bitmap to (sliced?)HAM in semi-realtime.
It wouldn't have worked on anything less than an A3000 with at least 2 megs, and would have probably had a real update rate of around .25 to 2fps (not counting sprites), but DAMN, it would have had some killer screenshots in AmigaWorld and sold a few thousand copies before anybody realized the underlying game itself either sucked or was only cool due to the graphics (kind of like the UFO game that was basically a HAM background with sprites animated over it that that sold lots of copies despite sucking as a game, just because it was a game that used HAM).
Re:Damn... (Score:5, Insightful)
noun
a disordered or incorrectly functioning organ, part, structure, or system of the body resulting from the effect of genetic or developmental errors, infection, poisons, nutritional deficiency or imbalance, toxicity, or unfavorable environmental factors; illness; sickness; ailment.
Aspergers seems to fit the definition of disease.
Re:Damn... (Score:5, Insightful)
And I suppose people with sickle cell disease [wikipedia.org] are merely suffering from prejudices as well? After all, it's a "genetic difference" as well.
I did notice you were careful never to actually say that diseases cannot be genetically based, so I assume you are willing to grant that some are. If you're willing to grant that sickle cell disease is indeed a disease, as I would assume you are, then you'd need to draw the line at some place, but where? We would both agree that having a different eye color is not a disease, but I think we may differ, in that I tend to lean more towards believing the non-politically correct idea that if a genetic mutation leaves you significantly less capable of functioning, whether due to mental or physical differences, it would be a disease. Of course, at least to me, "disease" is purely descriptive of a condition, and in no way prescribes a behavior or response.
For instance, to quickly clarify what it does not necessarily mean, it does not mean that they are necessarily at a disadvantage. Sickle cell disease confers malarial resistance, and at least in the case of my friends with Asperger's, they have exceptional abilities to recollect minute details from long ago (whether that's a learned skill or a trait of the way their brain is wired differently, I couldn't say with certainty, of course, but I believe the latter). I don't see a reason to pity anyone in those positions, since they are people who must make the most of themselves, just like everyone else.
Additionally, it does not mean that they are inferior people. We define ourselves, and who a person is is more than just their body and mind. We are all born with things we need to work through, and whether that's a weak chin, dashing good looks, a bald spot, or Asperger's, we either choose to allow ourselves to be defined by them, or we choose to define ourselves despite them. That rests entirely on us and is entirely of our own doing. It's our own fault if we allow them to define us.
Long story short, just because someone has a genetic difference that may classify as an error (which isn't the case here, since Asperger's is hereditary) does not mean that THEY are an error, so people should stop treating "disease" like it's some sort of dirty word and call things what they are. This mentality of coddling people by using useless terms isn't helpful to anyone, and it gets in the way by delaying recognition and response. Instead, be honest. If I'm going bald, say I'm going bald. Dancing around semantics isn't helpful to anyone.
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To see this taken out of the DSM-5 is the greatest gift any kid with it can have. No longer will they feel outcast, no longer will they have to prove themselves, to rise above the rest of society simply because of a stupid name given by a German doctor. It's too broad of a disease with only one, maybe two specific symptoms. I have tried to get this removed many a time, but they all said that I wasn't qualified, they had the ink tests.
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My son was diagnosed with it in Kindergarten and at age 11 he is finally coming around to being able to not embarrass himself too much in social situations, though he still has a lot of work to do in dealing with social norms, like dealing with things that make him upset...however like others have said above I consider it an advantage to him since his cognitive abilities in most everything are 2-3 grade levels above normal due to the way he views and processes information, especially stuff that is nothing b
Re:Damn... (Score:5, Insightful)
Personally, I think we should do the opposite of what you're suggesting: abandon the word "disease" for all mental differences. Stop trying to draw artificial distinctions. Stop trying to pigeonhole. Approach each one - and each person - as an individual.
When you do that, you lose most of the advantages of Western medicine--and Eastern medicine, for that matter.
A mental disease is essentially a behavior pattern. Of course each person is an individual, but certain behavior patterns routinely present themselves, and by classifying them together we gain the power of abstraction: what heals or reduces the impact of a behavior pattern (disease) for one person might work for some others; what works for twenty or a hundred people will likely work for many more. Without being able to separately classify some behavior patterns apart from the individual who exhibits them, we're stuck with a lot more trial and error. I question if it's even possible for someone to treat people who have mental diseases without, through simple process of observation, finding himself classifying behavior and responding accordingly.
Here is an illustration of how classifying mental diseases can be helpful. I dated a girl who told me she suffered from depression. And that appeared evident to me as well. She also did other things too, though. I found that when we were on good terms, I was her favorite person in the world. But if I did one thing that she didn't like, something as simple as already having plans with friends when she wanted to get together, or a comment that she took the wrong way, I was instantly on her shitlist and would remain there for a day or two. There was no in-between. She felt this way about everybody. She was very manipulative, and she'd frequently fly into hysterical rages where she couldn't be reasoned with and the only "solution" was to ignore her for a day or two.
After I broke up with her, I stumbled across a description of Borderline Personality Disorder, and it described her behavior perfectly. I told her as much, and she looked it up and agreed. She went to do a depression study, part of which involved getting an analysis of conditions, and sure enough they told her she had both depression and BPD. Since she now knows what her behavior is classified as, she also has found strategies to help her cope with it. I've spoken with her a few times since then, and I can tell that there is a difference in her, and it's a pretty drastic change for having begun only a year ago.
Without the classification, she would have lived the rest of her life being as miserable and unable to connect with other people as she had been up until then. Once the classification is there, you can call it a disease or a disorder or a condition or whatever you like, it allows us to say "We've seen this before, and here are some things to try that helped other people." The term "disease" has connotations that perhaps it shouldn't, and I don't care much about semantics so I'm not attached to any word in particular, but refusing to classify things is throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
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I'm just going to jump in here and yell "BULLSHIT!". Ever looked up the definition of normal? Aspergers is a significant deviation from how a person functions mentally on average.
I'm going to go out on a limb here, and guess that you don't actually have a statistical definition of normal human mental processes to hand, so trying to use formal definitions of "normal" and "significance" is meaningless.
What a nice load of pathos. All irrelevant to the topic.
No. I'm pointing out that humans have a cognitive defect that causes us to label inconvenient mental configurations as "diseases", rather than addressing the important questions directly. Is this person happy? Can they achieve their goals without assistance? Can they effectively function
Re:Damn... (Score:5, Interesting)
Speaking as a person who exhibits most of the classical symptoms of Asperger's, I have to agree that it is an affliction, a disorder or disease.
I am not saying this to garner pity or priviledge... a parking spot would be nice though. I say this because if it is found to be preventable or curable, I would push for it It makes life needlessly difficult. There are simply things I cannot do. Among these include "going with the flow" which might seem like an easy, brainless thing to do, but it's not. The whole notion of merely "fitting it" is an amazingly complex thing which includes self delusion along with the ability to convince others of the same. I have spent more than enough time working it all through.
In PC terms, Asperger's is a bug in a person's social BIOS. The social BIOS cannot be flashed. It is the bootstrap for all social interactions. Things other people natually seem to understand are completely alien to the Asperger's person. But once we fully understand and appreciate the differences, effective changes can be made. It isn't a fix by any means. But learning to compensate is helpful, but also placing one's self in an environment where it exposes the afflicted to fewer people is also quite helpful.
I think most of us here on both sides of the general issue are failing to see the objective matters at hand. Asperger's is a disadvantage in most all cases except for when the other side-effects might appeat to be an advantage. We often associate specific mental abilities/capacities as "gifts" associated with the condition. This is not always the case and especially as the generally accepted autistics out there are not all idiot-savants.
Instead of identifying things, we tend to want to label things with words which do not have as universal a meaning as we think. This problem is identified by the arguments collapsing into a discussion about definitions of words. It is a problem of language and of social politics.
Asperger's is an advantage to me sometimes. I can disregard my emotional components to see the facts of the matters I observe. I don't always see all of the facts available at all times -- I have a limited capacity just like everyone else. But I have less propensity to fill in the gaps with belief and unsupported ideas.(Consider when you were a very young child... did you understand why girls and boys should dislike each other? I never did. I never saw cause. Go back in time and see which side of such questions you fell on... do you even remember?)
Re:Damn... (Score:5, Funny)
a parking spot would be nice though.
It's Howard spot now. You don't even drive, Sheldon
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Separating Asperger's from Autism is strange to me.
The most severe cases of Asperger's I've encountered are much like you describe. I have a friend who's had to learn to observe and respond to social behaviours and to not let himself get frustrated or emotional when things get difficult. Being around people who are open, accepting, understand and willing to point out these quirks helps.
The most severe case of Autism I've encountered involved a man who terrorized his loving and patient family, smashed
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You coded into RAM what others have in ROM quite naturally. There is the difference. I read what you wrote confused... I thought for a moment that I had written it.
Also, you were faced with the requirement to trade one part of yourself for another. This is not a requirement for others. You're still not "normal" and so you had to make compromises in order to appear more "normal." It's tragic, but I completely get what you're saying -- I live the same life.
I realized long ago that I was facing that sort
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Oddly enough - and I don't mean this jokingly - psychopaths are very good at doing the same thing. True clinical psychopaths have the inability to function normally by understanding other people's emotions and having any sort of empathy. To function in normal society, psychopaths -learn- social interactions in much the same way you did. It doesn't come naturally to them, but they are generally smart enough to realize their own personal lives will be more difficult if they don't learn these cues.
Of course
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Because you have a disconnect between natural and programmed responses. Even if some of your responses are genuine, you have disassembled that 'clockwork' and remanufactured it. It is no longer the thing you disassembled. It is now the thing you assembled whether or not it existed previously. We've all heard that by observing a thing, we are changing a thing.
Re:Damn... (Score:4, Insightful)
The main gripe with Aspergers being called a disease instead of what it actually is, a neurological functionality disorder.
The disorder part of it is due to people having it (like me) have certain disadvantages compared to the normal person.
A disease is something which is objectively bad.
If someone told me they could "cure" my aspergers I would be offended.
There are parts of my problem I'd like help alleviating, but loads of the things I gain from having it might get lost and I would probably be a very different person without it.
To say that AS should be cured is kinda like saying that the person questioning society should be lobotomized since they don't fit in.
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Have you ever thought that, yes, you will definitely change, but not because you lost something, but because you have gained something. The gaining may change the interpretation of what was there before but you will not lose it.
That being said, there are somethings I do miss. Before I could see the world, I had an unmatched freedom to be anywhere my imagination could take me. Now, I can still go inside, but ever s
Re:Damn... (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not a disease.
Well, not by that name any more any way.
One artificial psychiatric definition down, about 3500 to go [wikipedia.org].
Re:Damn... (Score:4, Insightful)
Aren't all definitions artificial?
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It's an enhancement!
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The problem is, provided that he really is an aspie, that he can't be taught these things. Social interaction for instance is highly dependent on being able to "read" peoples facial expressions at a glance. If he is some kind of autistic, he's simply unable to do that. With training and skill he might be able to do it by thinking and reasoning about it, but he will never do it on the fly, which is effectively the same thing as not being able to, because it's too slow. Besides that, having to do this will bu
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If its not a disease then you can't prescribe for it and insurance won't pay for it. Whenever in doubt of the hidden agenda, follow the money. These guides are essentially accounting code manuals, not medical in any way. It's very much the same as going to a mechanic for service and having them look up which procedures are covered under warranty.
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The really sad part is that I know from personal experience just how different Asperger's and true autism are. I had a good friend for many, many years that I sadly lost contact with that had Aspergers. A little awkward, but one of the most highly intelligent people I know. On the other hand, I also have an immediate family member that does fall on the autistic spectrum, and over several decades we've all been through the highs and the lows as a family.
Aspergers may be on the austisic spectrum, but they're nothing alike in real terms.
I also know first-hand how a label can effect self-confidence. I have Tourette Syndrome, very much controllable, but everyone's first frame of reference is that damn Rob Scheider movie. You've gotta laugh, but it does get awkward sometimes. I don't want to imagine how much anxiety highly ingelligent, high functioning but socially-anxious Aspergers sufferers are going to go through when they start being labelled autistic.
This is doing them a great disservice.
Re:Damn... (Score:5, Interesting)
"Aspergers may be on the austisic spectrum, but they're nothing alike in real terms."
I disagree. I have aspergers and I have 2 children who are both autistic. The are certainly some differences between us, but there is also a lot of similarities. One of the biggest things that we have in common is our low tolerance for difficult and stimulating situations.
I personally have always felt that aspergers really did fit under the ASD umbrella although it was medically as accepted that way until now.
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Aspergers may be on the austisic spectrum, but they're nothing alike in real terms.
It's a spectrum! The EM spectrum is quite similar...
You can't expect people at the mild end to show the same symptoms and behaviours as those as the severe end. Let's be honest here, we're all on the autistic spectrum somewhere, and I can easily believe the slashdot crowd are skewed towards one end from the population mean.
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Aspergers may be on the austisic spectrum, but they're nothing alike in real terms.
It's a spectrum! The EM spectrum is quite similar...
You can't expect people at the mild end to show the same symptoms and behaviours as those as the severe end. Let's be honest here, we're all on the autistic spectrum somewhere, and I can easily believe the slashdot crowd are skewed towards one end from the population mean.
Your analogy to the EM spectrum is quite apt here. Scientists know exactly what it is if they've been trained in Physics, EE, or Chemistry, pertly much nobody else knows what it means other than you have a poster with a rainbow on your wall. In a vacuum, they behave the same, but the equations that cover microwaves, visible light, and x-rays are very different when they become the least bit useful to you by reflecting off, getting absorbed, or traveling though stuff.
To Average Joe who will ultimately make d
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To be fair, no two people on the spectrum are the same, even if they both have Asperger's. Think of a social situation as an obstacle course. A neuro-typical person can navigate it with ease. Someone with Asperger's would be equivalent to navigating the course while relying on crutches. They can do many of the things that non-spectrum people do, but it might take them longer, takes much more effort, and some of the obstacles may prove too much for them. Meanwhile, the people with Autism (of the non-hig
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I doubt it. I considered myself to have mild autistic traits before I knew about Aspergers. Self diagnosers will self diagnose.
Re:Damn... (Score:5, Informative)
At the risk of being serious . . . (Score:4, Informative)
FWIW:
Only the name "Asperger's Syndrome" has been dropped. The collective set of symptoms and diagnostic criteria are in the DSM and there is no danger of the diagnosis disappearing. Just don't label it "Asperger's".
Apparently in some parts of the world (eg US) health insurers don't provide support because the word "Autism" is not in the name. If the label doesn't say autism then I guess it ain't autism. Go figure.
IMHO this is a particularly bad summary description.
It's only being renamed... (Score:5, Funny)
...to Slashdot Spectrum Disorder.
Re:It's only being renamed... (Score:4, Funny)
...to Slashdot Spectrum Disorder.
Er, no. That's something else entirely... it's when a geek goes to see a psychologist, and three hours later they leave because the psychologist goes rigid and becomes unresponsive for days. Afterwords, all they usually say for awhile after that is "500... 500... 500..." over and over again. Occasionally they get this funny look on their face and then they look at their watch and exclaim "Timed out! It's all out of time!" before returning to their stupor. They do eventually recover. It's theorized it's because direct contact with the geek psyche overwhelms a normal person, causing their brain to seize for a long time until the information overload subsides.
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You seem to assume that a psychologist is a "normal person". And, that is where your scenario falls on it's face. Shrinks are, in fact, some very strange people, haunted by their own ghosts and harassed by their own demons.
Re:It's only being renamed... (Score:4, Insightful)
The percentage of Aspberger's on Slashdot is probably higher than average.
And it may be a form of Autism, but sometimes it's tough to generalize too much since that will just cause psychiatrists and others to look at the person and consider him/her "normal" compared to the cases they work with instead of handing over you to someone that specializes in cases of the milder forms.
Re:It's only being renamed... (Score:5, Funny)
No, we're just assholes online.
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so much lol
sick and tired of labels (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:sick and tired of labels (Score:5, Insightful)
You're right. The best way to do that would be to stop using names for things, that just makes everything too confusing. Instead we should write a page explaining what we're referring too each time we mention a new concept in conversation.
Labels are shortcuts. They aren't always great, sometimes they need to be adjusted, but in many cases they are necessary and useful. In fact this could easily increase understanding by pointing out that it is not a separate issue, I don't know enough about Aspergers or Autism to conclude that but I get the impression that you aren't concluding the opposite. Just trying to sound intelligent by complaining about labels.
Re:sick and tired of labels (Score:4, Funny)
So, you're the poster formerly known as alienzed?
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:sick and tired of labels (Score:5, Funny)
So, when does life begin? If you're gonna be all "sciency", come up with a definition based on science as to when life begins.
On the otherhand, there is this joke. A priest, a minister and a rabbi are all arguing over when life begins. The Priest declares with certainty in his voice, "Life begins at Conception". The minister quickly chimes in, with equal certainty, "Life begins when the baby is born". The rabbi, quiet for most of the discussion, pips, "You putzes, life begins when the dog has died and the children move out!"
Re:sick and tired of labels (Score:4, Insightful)
Hundreds of millions of years ago. It's been an unbroken chain ever since.
Re:sick and tired of labels (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:sick and tired of labels (Score:5, Informative)
So when does life start?
That depends on how you define life. I define it as "a self-sustaining biological unit suitably equipped to survive in its nominal environment". Humans are not adapted to survive when immersed in amniotic fluid, and when they are immersed in it they aren't a self-sustaining biological unit. Your definition may be "any functioning cells", but that includes a leaf just fallen from a tree, a heart in an organ transport cooler, or the leg of a cat that's just been run over and otherwise reduced to pulp, and that's clearly way too broad.
Life OBVIOUSLY starts at conception.
Not obvious at all. At conception all you have is a single cell, and while there are single celled organisms, this cell isn't capable of surviving on it's own. It's just a free-drifting cell which will cease to function if it doesn't implant itself in the uterus wall within a matter of days, so at this stage it's biological but about as much "life" as a blood cell or a transplant organ.
Once it implants itself it relies 100% on the host (or mother if you prefer) for nutrition, oxygen, etc. This is also true of a kidney. Again, both are biological, but neither are independently self-sustaining biological units. Still not life by my definition, but life by the cat's leg standard.
After some months the internal organs develop to a point where it can survive outside the womb with varying degrees of artificial assistance. This could be considered life, but lacking the intervention it's not viable life, it will quickly die or suffer serious permanent damage in the event of a power outage, a faulty humidicrib, or even spontaneous organ failure due to stress.
Full term baby: definitely life. It breathes without assistance, it maintains it's own body temperature (not perfectly, true), its skin is suited to exposure to air...IOW, it is fully adapted to function as a biological unit in its nominal environment.
So unless you introduce unprovable religious concepts like a soul or use an effectively meaningless definition of life, it is by no means certain that life begins at conception.
Can you get life without conception?
Of course you can. Bacteria do just fine without it, and there are lots of higher species that can reproduce by parthenogenesis or other asexual means [dailymail.co.uk]. And if you're prepared to accept artificially supported life as life, I don't see why artificial cloning doesn't count.
Oh that's right, life starts AFTER the baby leaves the womb and not before.
Well, yes. Until that point it's only potential life, and sometimes confusing potential life with actual life can have dire consequences [guardian.co.uk]. HAND.
Re:sick and tired of labels (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, there is. Millions of years ago, life began in the oceans. Life (on Earth) hasn't ended yet, so there has not been an opportunity for it to begin again.
Eggs and sperm are both alive. Pretending life begins at some point in pregnancy is just hand-waving designed to repress women and ignore the horrors of pregnancies that have gone wrong.
Ass boogers (Score:5, Funny)
One advantage of the term "autism spectrum" is that it doesn't have a double entendre of "ass boogers".
Disclosure: I have this condition.
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And 10 years from now, kids will have no clue what the Assburgers [youtube.com] episode of South Park is about, now that Aspergers is going the way of "Don't touch that dial".
Re:Ass boogers (Score:5, Funny)
One advantage of the term "autism spectrum" is that it doesn't have a double entendre of "ass boogers".
Disclosure: I have this condition.
You might try wet wipes for that.
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Congratulations aren't in order yet, he has to wait until May. That is when he will officially no longer be an "Aspie" as they call it (I'm not sure I'd like to be referred to that either, it almost sounds like ass pie.)
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How is it not Ass-burgers? Ass-boogers is a pretty big stretch.
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About time (Score:4, Insightful)
I've worked with a number of people who share all the Asperger's traits. Rather socially awkward, some Obsessiveness, not the most physicaly gifted. Yes, I worked with scientists and engineers. But they were just different, and their traits were not a disability, it was who they were. And they are very good at doing what they do. And we all get along just fine.
The only people hurt by this decision is the Autism Speaks people, who will need to revise their statistics.
Re:About time (Score:4)
Unfortunately, decreasing the number of people said to have a condition is a good way to decrease its funding chances in the government subsidies to researchers.
That's bad news for those who actually have the condition--lessening the chances for their eventual cure.
The move itself is akin to splitting off persons who have compulsive tendency in their personalities from those diagnose-able with Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, and as such seems to be a reasonable change in categorization.
Re:About time (Score:5, Insightful)
The move itself is akin to splitting off persons who have compulsive tendency in their personalities from those diagnose-able with Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, and as such seems to be a reasonable change in categorization.
This is one of the most controversial aspects of psychiatry. Human behavior is all a spectrum. All of us (well, most of us anyway) have personality traits. One may be a bit tightly wound, or a bit too laid back, or sloppy or overly neat, or insensitive or smotheringly kind. The combination of those traits make us who we are.
The classical definition of a personality disorder has been when one or more of those traits becomes a dominant part of a persons personality and becomes 'harmful' to that person or society at large. We've all seen the psychopathic boss, the obsessive person who drives family and coworkers away, the very dependent person who wrecks relationships. But when do you call it a disorder? The first time someone complains about the boss? The first divorce? The first time you get into a fight?
It's a fluid distinction. Our favorite disordered personality, Stephen P. Jobs, might well have been banished to an Ashram if we had any sort of effective treatment. Balmer and Gates might have been turned into, well, dunno, I have nothing here. Anyway, it is at the heart of how we define normal (or at least acceptable). In many ways, we don't really want to get to the point where we can treat it or even understand it.
Careful what you ask for, you just might get it.
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good way to decrease its funding chances in the government subsidies to researchers.
That's bad news for those who actually have the condition--lessening the chances for their eventual cure.
So no harm, no foul then?
Do you know anyone "cured" by psychiatrist?
(Other than being drugged into a stupor).
Re:About time (Score:5, Informative)
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To qualify for the diagnosis, not only do the criteria have to be met, but it must cause clinically significant impairment in functioning. People always seem to overlook that part.
If you don't include the "significant impairment in functioning" part of the criteria, pretty much everyone who is working toward or has worked toward an advanced degree in a hard science or math fits the definition. Or at least they did while they were in their degree program. And, yeah, I have a M.S. in math.
Cheers,
Dave
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I think you meant to say "They were lucky to be able to position themselves in a job that allows an awkward, obsessive, clumsy person with a narrow focus of intellectual ability to prosper, and they are very good at doing what they do."
Re:About time (Score:5, Informative)
Well, not exactly, the DSM-5 at the same time removing the AS label relaxes the criteria of Autism Spectrum Disorder. Anyone who qualified for the criteria of Asperger's Syndrom qualifies for the DSM-5's criteria for proper autism. This is because there is little to no benefit at all in treating people with severe issues who have AS any differently from those with Autism. The only differentiator, really, between AS and classical Kanner's autism in the DSM-4 was a language delay, even if one had a language delay and coped better as an adult than someone who did not have one, that person would be diagnosed kanners and the one without the delay with aspergers. This caused as you can imagine a headache with regards to getting insurance or the state to cover any amount of therapy if you had the AS label even if you really needed it and your family wasn't in a position to reasonably afford it.
Re:About time (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm Cured! (Score:5, Funny)
Not that it's a good thing. Now when I make those curt judgmental remarks due my lack of a sensible social filter, I'm just being an asshole.
Need more sub-definitions (Score:5, Insightful)
Shout out to the Aspie Quiz [rdos.net], go take it! - HEX
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This is nothing but better categorization and summation in a general medical book. Everything cannot get its own section.
This does not mean that people with ASD will no longer be diagnosed in depth. I never read the original article and have no idea what this book is used for, but I know that is is not the sum of all medical knowledge.
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Umbrella terms exist so that facilities that care for these folks can apply for Medicaid funding set aside for specific groups of folks.
It has nothing to do with you and everything to do with how the big pile of money gets sorted.
What does it matter? (Score:4, Insightful)
Why does it matter if the label changes. The people who are affected by Aspergers Syndrome/Mild Autism Spectrum Disorder, such as myself, will be the same people regardless. The DSM V is really not changing anything significant to reality.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
> Why does it matter if the label changes
In theory it shouldn't, but as Yogi Bera said, "In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is". Caregivers tend to grab on to the labels assigned to their patients in order to simplify the task of treatment. In medicine, where there are many (if not the majority) of conditions which have well-defined and well-understood etiologies (and corresponding treatments), this is very useful. In psychiatry and psychology, I'm not so su
Nick of Time (Score:2)
Although I still hope for the day when People will cover star studded fundraisers for corns and calluses.
Met them (Score:5, Interesting)
I am willing to bet that there are quite a few Asperger's programmers out there but very few autistic programmers; testers maybe.
Re:Met them (Score:4, Interesting)
For whatever reason he was taken from a parent and put with another relative. Something along the lines of "Italian matriarchal type", and she had the old-school, conservative-like prejudices of "practically anything mammalian can be conditioned like Pavlov's dogs" and "things related by blood should be given lots of love", so she did both: when he "misbehaved", he got beatings [youtu.be], and the neural malformation or dysfunction that makes conditioning of behavior hard just meant that the discipline had to be that much more severe; at all other times, though discipline was very stringent, he was very much treated with love too.
So now the doctors and "experts" haven't a clue why, call him a miracle and mystery, but the guy functions with extreme...normality. He doesn't like to speak: he has both received a communications board (think Steven Hawkings) and been taught sign language, but seems to have something against language itself, and only talks with those he is very, very close to, but otherwise seems completely normal--slower than others yes, but he can get along, go out with people to enjoy himself, whether for a movie or playing put put.
Of course he really doesn't write, not that people with something against language could even be expected to try, much less people with extreme problems in neural development, but then again, nobody but family and insiders know why it is that he can actually function the way he does.
Or to summarize, he was viewed as a child with extreme behavior tendencies and a very strong will who had to be broken for his own benefit, and those around him, so that he could benefit from being social with those around him rather than isolated, and it worked. I think this suggest that the problem may lie partially in the "experts" picking-up some of the thinking from the damn social workers in schools and other "professional" fields: "O, Jonny has a syndrome that means he can't behave" (and yes, there is a diagnosis for this: it's also the symptom that portends that good teachers will quit public schools, and yes I have known a few of those too).
p.s. He is an adult now. Also, I do not say these things lightly: I was beaten--quite unjustly--rather frequently through certain portions of my childhood, by an inconsiderate father, who was often drunk (I ran away too: twice, the second time permanent), and just as mean the next day or days on "residual". I would be beaten over simple and trifling things, and even for things that I was not told were wrong or I shouldn't do, but simply because my father thought they either might make him look bad, or were not in accord with his ideals: also, the guy has few to no ideals and his opinions constantly move and shift: it was unpredictable, could come at any moment for anything, and it was living in hell day to day. There is a significant difference between discipline (for another's good) and that sort of abuse (beating someone with no appreciable reason or intended good, but out of mere anger).
Re:Met them (Score:5, Insightful)
Think of it this way:
You go in to the clinic because your spouse is worried about your health.
You're 50 lbs overweight and your cholesterol and blood sugar are too high.
Do we have a separate diagnosis for the person who's 100 lbs overweight? Does it matter what the label is?
You should be paying attention to what the psychologist, psychiatrist, social worker, your family, and what you yourself identify as your particular constellation of problems.
The label is useless and explains nothing. You don't have Aspergers, or Autism, or Autism Spectrum Disorder, you have a constellation of social cognitive problems that represent part of who you have been. The causes are probably unknown and may be unique to you or your family, just like the causes of someone else "with Aspergers" are unknown and probably unique to them or their family.
Do you want a ruler with one line on it that says "long"?
I'm not saying these aren't real problems, I'm just saying any label is useless.
I say this as someone who has worked on the DSM. Ignore it. It's not what matters.
Re: (Score:3)
It's always good to know your general location before attempting a journey.
Disorder my ass... (Score:5, Interesting)
Granted, there are many people who view this as a disorder. But there are also those of us who view it as a gift and view the challenges and the setbacks that it has presented as experiences that have had an extremely positive impact on our lives. While I sympathize with those who have trouble dealing with it, this is who I am and I would never want this to change.
I wold never want to be labeled as someone with a disorder, having a minimal to non-existent social life is fine by me. This is just putting a negative label on people who already have a lot of social stigma to deal with.
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Of course, there are many people who would do anything to become NT. I was there once.
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I think you mean "Disorder my ass burger."
C'mon, idiots. (Score:5, Informative)
Comment removed (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
There's this romantic idea that anyone who is introverted and likes math has Asperger's, therefore Asperger's is cool.
In the same way that sneezing a couple of times doesn't mean you have a cold, having some level of Asperger's traits doesn't mean you have Asperger's. Actual Asperger's syndrome have several drawbacks that people with the condition have to deal with, like for instance difficulty to do context switching.
Re:C'mon, idiots. (Score:5, Insightful)
Fact of life: if there are never any problems, and your task is keeping a service up, you may be fired because some bean counter will think you are a waste of money.
Sad News for the /. Community (Score:4, Funny)
No excuse? (Score:2)
So basically nerds no longer have any cover for their lack of social skills?
Re:No excuse? (Score:5, Funny)
What you mistake as a lack of social skills is my desire not to pollute my mind with the useless drivel you want to talk about. If that's not normal, then maybe I just don't want to play at being a "good person". I have no desire to be overly social with most humans. There is a big difference between not doing something by choice, and not being able to do something. I socialize quite well with those I wish to. The ones who would like to be social but can't still have an "excuse". Me? I've never made an excuse for not caring about what you think -- Why should I care if you've never given me a reason to? What's odd is the value you humans give to efforts that only result in the needless wasting of your very short lives.
Change the definition, no more problem! (Score:5, Insightful)
I know the trolls are lining up to post "Ass-burgers is fake anyway, I met an Ass-pie once, and he was fine."
So let me say this first: If you've met an Aspie and dismissed the condition because that person "seemed fine", then please consider that what you didn't see was the countless hours of practice and stress and anxiety of being able to pretend to be that way; the habitual exhaustion from the effort of doing so; the depression and abysmal self-esteem from never, never understanding the people around you or being able to tell whether people actually like you or not. The years of teasing and abuse, the subsequent years of retrospectively realising all the other things which were teasing and abuse at the time but we couldn't tell at the time. The incessant Impostor's Syndrome, which only gets worse the higher you rise -- if you can move forward in your career. Who speak nineteen languages, but get scurvy because they forget to eat. No, seriously: people whose executive dysfunction requires the scheduling of bathing and eating, or else a rigid routine, where even slight interruptions can trigger a panic attack. The meltdowns and fear and frustration and despair.
And you don't see the ones who don't "seem fine". Who weren't as fortunate as those of us who got a series of lucky breaks and have been able to work around our disabilities and take advantage of our strengths. The ones who killed themselves in despair or ended up on the streets or were institutionalised or are housebound on antidepressants and anti-anxiety meds.
The DSMV changes to the Autism Spectrum diagnoses have been widely stated by the people writing them to be for the purpose of excluding people from being diagnosed on the spectrum. Because when people started actually looking at how many people had an ASD, it turns out to be much more than anyone thought.
Obviously it can't be because so many people were swept under the carpet for all those years, so it must be a problem with the definition. Hey, if we change the definition of Cancer to exclude any condition of the skin, that means that all those people with melanomas must be cured, right?
It's only a strawman if it's not accurate. (Score:3)
It's not a strawman, it's barely even paraphrasing many of the comments on this very post.
Impostor's Syndrome is not a medical disorder indeed. Well spotted. You get a gold star. But from my point of view, it's something I've heard that other people don't have. It's really common amongst Autists and Aspies.
Obsessive-Compulsive disorder is the compulsion to enact non-functional rituals. That is not the same thing as being aware that you don't notice that you're hungry, and getting into the habit of eating a
Antisocial (Score:3)
Re:Antisocial (Score:5, Interesting)
It's not that people with Asperger's are anti-social. In fact, many with Asperger's *WANT* to be social. We just don't know how. (Yes, I have Asperger's as does my son.) Think of it as if you suddenly landed on an alien planet with strange and complex customs and social norms. You would likely find simple things in this world funny, but others wouldn't see why. You would commit social blunders that even a "normal" child born in the alien world wouldn't do. Over time, you might be able to slowly learn how to blend in socially, but it would be a chore. You'd constantly have to remind yourself just what to do in each situation.
Merely remembering them isn't enough. You need to remember and put them into effect on a split second basis. You could manage it, and might even appear "normal", for periods of time, but it would be taxing and you'd need downtime to relax. So you'd be constantly torn between "want to socialize" and "socializing is hard and tiring."
Congratulations! (Score:5, Interesting)
Good Riddance to a Bad Eponym (Score:5, Interesting)
Personally, I've never been too comfortable using the term "Asperger's syndrome" given its history. Dr. Asperger was an Austrian pediatrician who developed a clinical interest in psychiatric disorders. He was the medical director of special education in the University Children's Hospital in Vienna. In 1944 he published a description of what we now call Asperger's syndrome.
By this point, some alarm bells should be ringing in your head. That's at the end of WWII, in an axis country. Sure enough, they were euthanizing children en mass at that facility. Dr. Asperger's role was to determine which would be allowed to live under the eugenics regulations, and which would be killed. I encourage you to re-read the definition of his syndrome with this context in mind... And lest you think he was saving kids, he never objected to his role and kept his job until he retired in 1970. Furthermore, while history is sketchy on exactly who arranged it, 400 disabled children were killed for research purposes (specifically brain dissection), on the order of a pediatrician at Dr. Asperger's hospital...
Current research shows that Asperger's and Autism are an arbitrary distinction, which one might expect from the history. Also, Grunya Sukhareva discovered the same thing in Russia 18 years earlier.
To be fair, much of this is connecting the dots from an unclear historic record. Most of the records were destroyed, hence why Dr. Asperger wasn't executed for war crimes. Of course, maybe he heroically tried to save as many children as possible, but there's no evidence for it and he never made that claim.
I don't have Asperger's Syndrome. (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm unsympathetic and uncommunicative because I don't like you and I think you're all twats.
The Elephant In The Room (Score:3)
What bothers me the most about modern mental 'disorders' is that they seem to have come about as a result of a 'popular' rejection of Freudian psychology -- in particular, relating to the role of nurture on the psyche.
The sad truth is, people who are afraid of social rejection probably learned that fear from the actions of their parents. Period. Now, I'm sure all of you self-protective parents are going to shortly mod this post into oblivion, but as someone who fell under the wheels of the 'autistic' bus, only to emerge and prove that diagnosis to be largely unfounded, I am quite adamant about my position.
If you parent improperly -- if you teach your child that people cannot be trusted -- you will have socially maladjusted children. It's just how it is. Simple cause and effect. Nurture, not nature.
However, much to my great personal suffering and on-going chagrin, we now live in a society that has decided, at some point along the modern road of ever-sharpening curves, that it's 'unproductive' to criticise parents about their parenting, but impractical to educate them properly, and politically difficult to take their children away from them when they're obviously doing them mental damage.
This has in turn led to a disastrous multi-generational scenario where children who had bad parents grew up to -- guess what -- be bad parents.
And now, to make that problem even worse than it already was, the 'powers that be' have decided 'in their infinite wisdom' that the nebulous definition of 'Asperger's Syndrome' could have been leading to 'unproductive' guilt in the minds of the parents of so-'afflicted' children, and that to solve this 'problem', we've opted to move this collection of symptoms over to the autism spectrum in an effort to re-assure these disconcerted parents that it's really a physical problem -- a congenital birth-defect -- and not anything they've personally done to their child.
To be quite frank, this is bullshit. Parenting is hard -- I understand that, and nobody is questioning that. But no parent should ever be given a 'free pass' to disassociate themselves from their child's social difficulties by being absolved of blame at every turn through bullshit 'diagnosis' that attempt to make everything a 'developmental' problem.
This does not encourage behaviour change on the part of parents, and only serves to only allow the damage to continue unabated, further aggravated by the ultimate stigmatisation of a child who is ultimately told that they were 'born defective', and that normality will be a hard road, if one even traversable at all.
The reality is, bad parenting breeds anxious, depressed, socially awkward children. This is obvious to anyone who contemplates it for even but a moment. This is the 'elephant in the room' -- children do not want to blame their parents. Parents do not wish to feel guilt about the lives of their children. So, we all dance around, blaming it on in-vitro 'accidents', or poor genetics -- anything but to face the truth, that socialisation is the ultimate responsibility of parents, and the failure of socialisation lies chiefly at their feet.
Well, I am here to lay that blame. It will not make me popular. But parents need to know that it may not be a congenital defect, but instead that at a crucial moment, you laid little Nancy down when she needed you most. Nobody wants to deal with that, but for the sake of the child, they should.
Overblown. (Score:3)
As if Autism Spectrum Disorder isn't already misdiagnosed enough. And Asperger's Syndrome is another one that gets nonsense diagnoses. It's really gotten to a point where a kid who's slightly different will get diagnosed with autism. In fact, I've seen a school try that with a friend's son. I've interacted with this kid many a time; he's perfectly normal. It's like lack of conformity is an illness.
But I can't help but wonder if there aren't monied interests behind all this. This sort of thing is a huge money-making machine. And it's a convenient scapegoat for parents. Is your kid poorly behaved? Lack of discipline? Give him a disorder and it's no longer your fault.
What gets me is that no one questions the statistics. In 1980 the autism rate was over 1 in 1000. Earlier this year it was claimed to be 1 in 88. How is that possible? Some of the suspected causes have been disproved. So far nothing in our environment has been found to coincide with this rise. The only thing I can possible think of is the rise of wireless technology. But I think the real culprit is simple misdiagnosis.
Real autism is nothing like the crap people bring up. A family friend has a daughter with autism, and she can't function without being cared for constantly. She told us an interesting story about New Jersey. It was found that the autism rates there were exceptionally high compared to the rest of the country. Someone did some digging and realized that the reason for this is that parents with autistic kids were moving to the state because that's where a lot of the best research was occurring. That said, I continue to find articles talking about epidemic levels of autism in the state. The reality is even hinted at in some of those articles, but "journalists" would never let those facts get in the way of sensationalism.
Re:Psychiatry, not geekdom (Score:5, Informative)
Because many of us have at least been accused of having it. Or are "self-diagnosed" as having it. Or were even diagnosed by an actual psychiatrist.
Re:Psychiatry, not geekdom (Score:4, Interesting)
Because many of us have at least been accused of having it. Or are "self-diagnosed" as having it. Or were even diagnosed by an actual psychiatrist.
There's a not-actually-diagnostic Autism Spectrum Quotient [wikipedia.org] test that you can take at Wired [wired.com].
It might be fun to have a Slashdot poll on the range of results.
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Tom, get off the couch. For Suri's sake, try not to be such an asshole. And for FSM's sake, it's ok to come out of the closet.