What's Your AQ?

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Eight years ago, when Cam was first diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome, and more recently, when that diagnosis was "updated" to ADHD and Pervasive Developmental Disorder, Not Otherwise Specified (PDD-NOS - a 'subthreshold' condition in which some - but not all - features of autism or another Pervasive Developmental Disorder are identified) I started to wonder about my own quirky personality.

I've always known that I do things a little (lot) differently than most people, that I struggle with personal relationships and that I have heard many of the same things growing up that Cam is now hearing in his education process (if only you would apply yourself, you're a smart girl, why don't you get this, etc.), but I really never considered giving it a label.

I'm a grown-up. I support myself. I can hold down a job. Sure, I'd like to have more friends/be able to maintain friendships better, but all-in-all, life is fine. I function relatively well.

Then Mike sent me THIS LINK to an AQ (Autism-Spectrum Quotient) Test described by Wired as:

Psychologist Simon Baron-Cohen and his colleagues at Cambridge's Autism Research Centre have created the Autism-Spectrum Quotient, or AQ, as a measure of the extent of autistic traits in adults. In the first major trial using the test, the average score in the control group was 16.4. Eighty percent of those diagnosed with autism or a related disorder scored 32 or higher. The test is not a means for making a diagnosis, however, and many who score above 32 and even meet the diagnostic criteria for mild autism or Asperger's report no difficulty functioning in their everyday lives

OK ... fine ... I decide to take the silly little test expecting a score a little above the control group. I'm realistic. I figured I'd be a little off the norm.

Ummm ... no ... I am WAY off the norm. I scored 43. Forty-fucking-three!

Now, I realize that this 43 really doesn't mean a damned thing. I'm not going to give myself some AQ label and use that as an excuse for all that goes wrong in my life because that would be ... well ... pitiful (although quite convenient), but it did get me thinking ...

I'd love to learn where my readers fall on this scale *hint*hint* I could plot all of the data and even give you a statistical analysis if you'd like! Or not ... *chuckle*

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*UPDATE* You knew I'd have to do this, right?? And no! It's not too late to add data. I'll update the graph again tomorrow.

I don't have access to the statistics module in Excel, so I did a scatter chart with labels. Guess what?? With the 17 who have responded so far, we have a pretty bell curve! On average, the scores ran higher than the sample group, but I attribute that to the fact that, according to this data, those with a propensity for math, physical sciences and engineering generally score higher.

MEAN: 21.88
MEDIAN: 22


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