ARTICLE
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Asperger’s syndrome – Difference or disorder? Louise Elliman looks at the strengths associated with Asperger’s syndrome, from a social model of disability perspective
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questions
Research suggests that a high percentage of individuals with AS also have mental health problems. How does this impact on the question of whether AS is seen as a difference or a disorder? Should the social model be applied to the mental health problems faced by those with AS?
resources
Shakespeare, T. (2006) Disability rights and wrongs. London: Routledge. www.tonyattwood.com.au
references
There is currently much controversy over the status of Asperger’s syndrome (AS) and how individuals with AS should be viewed within society. Is AS a disorder in need of diagnosis and treatment, or even curing if that were possible? Or should AS be seen as a personality difference – the extreme end of a spectrum of traits possessed by many individuals in the general population to some extent? Has AS become a disability solely due to unfair barriers within society? Or can the social difficulties faced by those with AS still be appropriately viewed as a direct consequence of their underlying impairments?
American Psychiatric Association (2010) DSM-5 Development: 299.00 Autistic disorder. Retrieved 11 May 2010 from www.dsm5.org/proposedRevisions/pa ges/proposedrevision.aspx?rid=94# Attwood, T. (2002). The profile of friendship skills in Asperger’s syndrome. Jenison Autism Journal, 14, 3. (Available via www.tonyattwood.com.au) Attwood, T. (2007). The complete guide to
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observed in those with AS, for example physically larger brains and increased cell density in some areas of the brain, this cannot necessarily be taken as evidence that this type of brain is better or worse than a typical brain. Baron-Cohen (2000, 2002) has argued that those with AS are more object-focused and oriented towards ‘folk physics’, whereas typically developing individuals are more likely to be peoplefocused and oriented towards ‘folk psychology’. However, he points out that being ‘object-focused’ is only a disability in contexts in which people are expected to be sociable, and may actually be an advantage in certain careers such as engineering or computing (Baron-Cohen, 2002). So what are the implications of taking context into consideration when viewing AS?
t is generally accepted that Asperger’s syndrome (AS) lies within the autism spectrum, and as such it has long been seen entirely as a developmental disorder consisting of impairments in social interaction, social communication and imagination (Wing & Gould, 1979). However, in addition to the known difficulties associated with AS it has recently been argued that in some individuals there are also many associated The medical and social models strengths (e.g. Baron-Cohen, 2002). These The view of AS as a difference rather than are not merely the positive character traits a disorder is consistent with the social that individuals may possess despite their model of disability (Oliver, 1983). This AS, but genuine strengths that many model arose out of a series of campaigns individuals possess because of their AS. by the Union of Physically Impaired In terms of intelligence, those Against Segregation (UPIAS) in the 1970s with AS (unlike those with classic autism) and began by emphasising the fact that have an IQ within the normal range. On people with impairments also face social certain subscales of intelligence tests, those with AS have even been found to perform better than their typically developing peers (e.g. Mayes & Calhoun, 2008; Shah & Frith, 1993). They also tend to have superior attention to detail and perform better at tests involving finding images embedded within other images (Mottron et al., 2006; Shah & Frith, 1993). Indeed it has often been suggested that many successful and creative figures from history such as Wittgenstein, Einstein and Mozart may have shown characteristics of AS (e.g. Fitzgerald, 2004; Ledgin, 2002). Baron-Cohen (2002) argues Barrier-free utopia? No meeting, communicating with, or havi that although a range of interpret other people neurological differences have been
Asperger’s syndrome. London: Jessica Kingsley. Bagatell, N. (2010). From cure to community: Transforming notions of autism. Journal of the Society for Psychological Anthropology, 38(1), 33–55. Baron-Cohen, S. (2000). Autism: Deficits in folk psychology exist alongside superiority in folk physics. In S. Baron-Cohen, H. Tager-Flusberg &
D. Cohen (Eds.) Understanding other minds: Perspectives from autism and developmental cognitive neuroscience (2nd edn). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Baron-Cohen, S. (2002). Is Asperger syndrome necessarily viewed as a disability? Focus on Autism and Other Developmental Disabilities, 17(3), 186–192. Batten, A., Corbett, C., Rosenblatt, M. et
al. (2006). Make school make sense. Autism and education: The reality for families today. National Autistic Society. Retrieved 27 April 2010 from www.nas.org.uk/nas/jsp/polopoly.jsp? d=1517 Bauminger, N., Shulman, C. & Agam, G. (2003). Peer interaction and loneliness in high-functioning children with autism. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders,
vol 24 no 2
february 2011