Wikipedia talk:Autistic editors

Some Concerns

Errrrrr....I have a few problems here, which I will make in point form (sorry to rain on yer parade but I don't think this essay is a Good Idea)

1. IRL, the diagnosis of autism is based on behaviours, and the treatment is generally based on addressing behaviours, hence......the actual label does not impact on how one would help/remedy/fix issues...one would be practical and find solutions based on the deficits and goals.
2. I've seen editors label themselves as having aspergers' or autism yet not display anything in their interactions suggestive of this...and other editors not labelled who do.
3. Given point (1), what we should be concentrating on is how an editor interacts with others - strengths and weaknesses will become clear, regardless of whether there is a label attached. I am concerned that focussing on a label complicates this and might influence others in pre-judging too harshly or too leniently on an editor with a problem interacting with others.

I do think this page is well-intentioned, but am just concerned about the end result. Wikipedia is amazing in how it allows us to review our interactions with others over and over (almost like having a recording of a therapy session really). I'd be happy to be proven wrong on this one or needlessly pessimistic so fire away....Casliber (talk · contribs) 13:11, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

I don't mind you raining on my parade (I shall forgive you!) I'm focussing (obviously) on high-functioners here, and (as you almost certainly know!) the whole thing is a greyscale, with a huge mass of variation. It's just that several people have asked me (on wiki, in IRC, by email, etc.) if I could write something up, no matter how basic, which might help out in any way. Being an HFA myself, having family members on the spectrum, and having professionally taught Aspies and auties as well, I just jotted down some of the stuff I've found works for me both as an HFA and as a teacher. I found the drawing-of-parallels, using sound or vision-based metaphors, often worked very, very well.

I think possibly the most important statements in the whole thing are "...being on the autism spectrum is no excuse for unacceptable behaviour" and "Being on the autism spectrum does not give you carte blanche to be a dick as well." I don't care whether people have the label but don;t choose to reveal that information, or are A-spectrum but never diagnosed, so unlabelled, or whether they're neurotypical (or neurotypical and wrongly-self-labelled for whatever reason); I'm just hoping that there may be things there which give people of all kinds a few ideas on tweaking communication strategies.

Many thanks for your input; we'll see how it goes! Pesky (talk) 17:11, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

I guess where I am coming from is wikipedia is great for being judged on one's edits alone, without Real World factors coming into it. It's just amazing what sort of folks interact - the ultimate melting pot and (hopefully) level playing field. To that end, one's strengths or weaknesses in interacting with others will lend themselves to solutions from other editors, and diagnosis or lack thereof will not change how that goes. For mine, the fewer labels the better really. Casliber (talk · contribs) 04:23, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

In fact, we can all be as anonymous as we choose on Wikipedia. —MistyMORN 21:01, 14 August 2012 (UTC)

Oh, really? I'd never have guessed

"we have some excellent autism-spectrum admins here"? I resemble that remark, sir or madam goodman or goodwife as the case may be! --Orange Mike | Talk 18:09, 6 April 2012 (UTC) (mildly Aspie, he believes)

I think "Badass British Eccentric Granny" maybe sums it up best. People should never think of Autism-spectrum stuff as a disability or disorder unless it's the sort with real difficulties. It's not "abnormal", when it's high-functioning, it's just "less usual". Just like some hair colours and eye colours and blood groups are "less usual". It's only a difference, and it's not necessarily a bad difference in many cases. Pesky (talk) 21:05, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

Autistic people should not be labeled high-functioning or low-functioning, because the functioning level of an autistic person varies, and also to be diagnosed with clinical autism one must have clinically significant functional impairment. A "high-functioning" autistic person may struggle with daily tasks, and a "low-functioning" autistic person may be non-verbal (for example) but be able to communicate (by other methods, such as typing and PECS) and be actually intelligent (intellectually or otherwise). WPEditor42 (talk) 23:29, 19 August 2022 (UTC)

Cite needed

Rather than mar the beauty of your essay, I thought I would ask here for a cite for "(and it's estimated that most humans use less than 90% of the wired-up potential of their brains!)". I have seen this claim debunked, and could probably find a cite for its not being true... Good work otherwise. --John (talk) 20:07, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

Hah, we even have an article on how it's an urban myth! Isn't Wikipedia wonderful... --John (talk) 20:13, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

Y'know, it's odd how much stuff there is in that encyclopedia thingie ... I shall remove that bit! One story (I cannot for the life of me remember where I read it) which amazed me was of a woman who had no apparent centre to her brain - just a large, non-brain-filled gap, with all the brain tissue in a layer around the inside of her skull. Pesky (talk) 20:58, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

Not so sure about that one either, Pesky. ;-) —MistyMORN 21:01, 14 August 2012 (UTC)

Thanks!

This is gold! You are spot on in several points about Wikipedia being a honey-trap for such people, they can do the most amazingly thorough and detailed accurate work, and they can be a right pain to deal with.

I speak as someone who is more on the "pain to deal with" than the "thorough work" end of the spectrum. :)

The best part of your essay is the suggested strategies to aid communication. One of the most difficult aspects of dealing with such people is that they are often quite unable to admit that they are wrong about something, and when they are presented with good evidence to show that they are, in fact, incorrect, there is the most spectacular emotional storm. This doesn't help anyone, but obviously in an encyclopaedia we can't be presenting misinformation as if it were true, no matter how attached an editor is to it.

Catching and correcting these things before they reach a climax is something well worth aiming at. I've often felt like a complete bully trying to find some way to get a message across to someone who just won't accept it. I know that if I press too hard, it's going to hurt, but on the other hand it's often something that can't be left to fester.

Now, I don't want to go labelling anybody as a problem editor in this way, but sometimes they present as just an egocentric jerk, and by the time the truth becomes apparent, there is a history of conflict and wikistress, mediation and bans and so on. When one of these people gets to be an admin, it can be a disaster.

I wonder if there is some way that editors, especially new editors, who are moving along that path can be warned and directed to your essay before things get too far. New editors are presented with a very steep learning curve already and just giving them a list of really useful stuff to read when all they want to do is get to work just means that the pile of good stuff is set aside and forgotten about.

Anyway, good to see something happening in this area. Keep up the good work! --Pete (talk) 01:50, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

Thank you so much! Speaking as a high-functioning autistic myself, I've found over and over again that in so may situations, it's plain and simple misunderstanding, each of the other, that causes such a lot of potential difficulty. Idiomatic language where we're not speaking quite the same idiom, or people expecting you to read between the lines (or people reading between the lines of something I said / wrote, and reading something which was never there in the first place, lol!) The real key to problem-free communication is absolute clarity. Say exactly what you mean, and accept that the Aspie/autie has (almost guaranteed) done the same thing. There's an awful lot on our policy and guideline pages which could really do with being re-worded in the most simple, most clear way possible, just to avoid misunderstandings, or the wrong emphasis being read into the wrong things. In most ways we can't generalise about A-spectrum people, because there's as much variety within that group as there is within the neurotypical group; but just getting inter-editor communications to be clear, even if we say the same thing using three different parallels to cover all the bases where necessary, would do such a lot. And tolerance, each of the other, when it comes to basic communications glitches (note, I'm not saying "tolerance of incivility" or anything), and lashings and lashings of straightforward kindness and patience. Of course this really applies to all our WikiCommunications, we should all strive to be like that anyway, but especially so when we have groups with such differing thought-processing methods. Pesky (talk) 04:57, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

Ooooh, I've got to add a bit about the "emotional storm" thing! I don;t know if this holds true for all A-spectrum people, but it seems to have done for the vast majority of those I've known, and it certainly does for myself. If we discover that something we were taught turns out to be wrong, it feels like the most incredible betrayal – it's like "the world lied to me, how can I trust the world?", or "that person told me a lie, how can I know I can trust anything else they ever said again?" It's as if you've been "living a lie" for all the time you believed that fact, and reality was unfaithful to you. It can be totally devastating; it can seriously undermine our emotional foundations.

Finding out that what used to be believed true has just been investigated with better techniques, though, or the information is updated, and understanding (if we can!) that the place we originally got that information wasn't deliberately lying to us, to "set us up", is different. But it really can shake our whole world to discover that what we believed was the truth turns out to have been "a lie" all along. I think one of the reasons why A-spectrum people can get on so very well with animals (when they do) is that animals never tell lies. And they never pretend to be feeling something which they're not really feeling. Animals are straight with you, all the time.

Summing up: it's not "discovering you were wrong" which causes that total upheaval; it's "discovering" that "the world lied to you". When you come across it again, think of it as being like you were the person who just told a six-year-old that there's no Santa Claus. Pesky (talk) 05:15, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

There's no Santa Claus!?! - whaaaat??? Oscar Bravo (talk) 08:05, 14 November 2014 (UTC)

That's a useful way of looking at it. I think of Rain Man and The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time as rough guides. The anguish suffered is very real, and yet avoidable with the right tactics. Your example of hearing different parts of the same spectrum is a good one too. I'll try to be more clear in my expression here - I tend to leave a lot to be inferred and of course it will quite often be taken the wrong way. Anyway, thanks again. Let's hope you spark some love and understanding all round. --Pete (talk) 05:57, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

I really hope so. It will feel like such an enormous achievement to make a real difference. And definitely try to remember to avoid leaving things to be inferred; A-spectrum people are often heavily into information-sharing (another reason why Wikipedia is a honey trap). The concept of leaving something to be inferred can be a very foreign one – it's a bit like "deliberately hiding something", and then wondering why someone can't find it! Pesky (talk) 06:19, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

Grauniad

Hi Pesky, Did you see the article in yesterday's Guardian: "Autistic workers: loyal, talented … ignored" ? Might be of interest. PamD 07:44, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

I try tro avoid reading / watching news (it's usually so depressing, and I reckon that anything which happens that is likely to affect me, personally, I will probably get to hear about anyway ...) I shall go and read that one now. Pesky (talk) 22:30, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

Excellent article; Im going to add that in the Further reading section. Pesky (talk) 22:38, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

Agree. —MistyMorn (talk) 17:14, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

Problem With This Essay

After giving this a read, I can't agree with it and I have been diagnosed with Aspergers. It's bad enough people with Autism or Aspergers are treated differently in the real world, I don't think we need to be treated differently (or have a label on our heads) here on Wikipedia as well. As long as we follow the rules already laid out, both those on the spectrum and the neurotypicals (the "normal" people), we all should be fine. There is no need for a while new set of rules (or an essay) for people with Autism or Aspergers. - Neutralhomer • Talk • 04:21, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

FWIW, that insight helps me understand some of your edits a bit more. —MistyMORN 21:10, 14 August 2012 (UTC)

That echoes with what I said above - diagnosis should be irrelevant to someone's ability to edit. Casliber (talk · contribs) 06:28, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

You are right, it does pretty much echo what you wrote. :) Well, that's what I get for not reading the entire talk page before posting. :) - Neutralhomer • Talk • 07:11, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

I'm attempting to address the problem where certain editors seem to define Autism-spectrum editors as equivalent to "Retards and spazzes", for example. I have posted to the relevant editor's talk page about this. I do appreciate the perceived problems with the essay, but it's such a huge subject that one can't hope to cover it all, just a few bases which are the ones which seem to have most in-Wikipedia effect. I'm not trying to create a new set of rules, just to highlight a particular area where WP:AGF seems regularly to fall flat on its face. We're getting problems in here caused by mutual misunderstandings between "types", which could so easily be avoided with a tad more insight. Neutralhomer's userbox at {{User:Neutralhomer/Userboxes/AAAwareness}} is also a good one. (Ta!) my bit of self-revelation covers how (and under what circumstances) I managed to work out some communication things. If only more people were prepared to go the extra mile for understanding, instead of just attacking and dismissing ...

Pesky (talk) 08:33, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

I found this whole situation to be pretty amusing. Evidently all those involved needed/need to take a hike and stop being so offended about something they read on the internet. It should not impede your Wikipedia editing. This is just as dumb as YouTube arguments. My brother is Autistic...I'm a fiery bitch, but hey we can all edit here and there's nothing no one can do about it. As long as our edits follow the rules and guidelines. IGNORE it. --Τασουλα (talk) 14:51, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

• I think the issue is a delicate one. I'm sure if I had received some sort of an AA diagnosis (or someone close to me had) then that experience would inevitably colour my perceptions on initiatives such as this in one way or another. As others have remarked, the AA spectrum is very varied, and it's difficult to make generalizations which always make sense on an individual level.

  Pesky's initiative to raise awareness and facilitate a friendlier environment (for AA people, but not only) is, I think, relevant the Wikipedia community as a whole. Especially given: 1) the attraction that various Wikipedia tasks are likely to hold for people with characteristics commonly found on the AA spectrum; and 2) the common pitfalls we're all exposed to in online communication with nicknamed anons we have never met in the flesh, and in the absence of many the normal social (eg visual) cues. As noted above, nobody here is obliged to reveal their identities or records of any type, so I feel there is no reason to feel any individual to feel exposed to unwanted attention or positive discrimination. Pesky's initiative is aimed at improving the environment for all of us. An obvious example is her plan to encourage use ofplain English in WP policies and guidelines. —MistyMorn (talk) 17:10, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

I completely agree with your observation, I came to this page because some person randomly linked it to an editor they assumed to be autistic simply on the basis of one of their edits being disruptive, articles like this further the stereotypes that autistic people seek special treatment (while from my observations this article has only been used as an "attack page"), and no editor should be judged on anything else than their edits, it's bad enough that a double standard applies to editors who have been here for a long time, for example in the Microsoft articles sphere we have one editor who is blatantly inconsistent in their edits and deliberately laughs at anyone who dares to point out "other stuff exist" and will claim the exact opposite of what they claimed on another talk page simply "to be right", or another editor blatantly reports others after they themselves start using curse words and they get away with it because there basically is a syndicate of editors who back each other's edits up, these people seem to call out wiki-policies only when it suits them and to use them against them and their edits will immediately be met with a dismissal for the fact that they've simply been editing for a longer time, I hate double standards and another one that annoys me is that Wikipedia actively tries to appeal to female editors claiming that "Wikipedia is sexist" solely based on the fact that most editors are male, let me say this for the record here No one is above anyone else, and edits should be judged, not people I don't care if one person makes their first edit and the other has been an editor for years, if the previous' edit was right and the latter was wrong then we shouldn't excuse the latter because they're more experienced, though this behavior has even become a rule in the Wikicommons site it shouldn't become a rule here, and this article claims that some autistic people will do something like "don't revert my vandalism, I'm an Aspie" or something, believe me you'd literally never see that and ThePeskyCommoner is right, autistic people are discriminated enough in real life if you live in the Dutch tyranny they'll sabotage any chance of you getting a proper education, meanwhile this discrimination doesn't exist in allegedly "less developed" countries like Indonesia, there they only look at results and how someone performs at a test, we at Wikipedia should be more like Indonesia and less as the Netherlands, and so far I've seen this "essay" being used more as a form of personal attacks on other editors, I'm not arguing for its deletion but I don't get why it should have "Wikipedia:" in front of it almost making it a set of rules. --58.187.228.171 (talk) 01:48, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Another thing that could be taken into account is that there is a higher proportion of autistic people in Wikipedia. I've been made aware of an ongoing research that would suspect a majority (as in 50%, and based on the exact numbers, majority is an understatement) of Wikipedia editors being in this demographic. However, I don't know if it is or when it will be finished, so I can't provide the source but for future reference, you might want to keep an eye out for such stats to add to these articles. For now, you should only treat this as a rumor, it doesn't have any credibility until it's official.

No matter the exact statistic, it seems like a widely accepted fact that the Wikipedia community is more concentrated in autistic members than the average in the general population. It might heavily impact the proportion of female versus male humans, whatever the correct term to use is (sorry I'm not keeping up with these things). Indeed, there are more diagnosed men for autism, if I remember correctly the ratio is 3x (take it with a grain of salt). The reason is that communities of girls, particularly during teenagehood, are highly social and put more emphasis on "socializing with others". I'm glossing over it just to tell the important details, basically it means girls have more pressure to cater to social standards even as autistic people. This leads to a high proportion of them mimicking other girls around them to integrate and internalize a "normal behaviour".

This results in less women being diagnosed with autistic indicative behaviour, even though there might be almost just as many of both sex behind the scenes of "official diagnosis". Just to be clear, I'm only putting this in quotes because it feels wrong to call it either official or pretend it's a real diagnosis. As I've just mentioned, simply being a girl can affect it, but a ton of other factors like giftedness (another term that I hate for its inaccuracy) can affect it. They're not measuring how autistic you are, at all. They're just measuring how autistic your behaviour is, and only superficially, outside of your comfort environment and in a short time frame.

Sorry if these clarifications were unnecessary. What I wanted to say is that I think (this is a subjective guess) that the same reason why girls will drop superficial autistic behaviours to fit in might just make them lose part of the strength of being autistic. You can't have the best of both worlds: either you fit in by forcefully developing the underdeveloped social parts of your brain or yu capitalize on your strength and accept that socializing is your weakness. If most autistic girls chose the first, and if such a big part of the Wikipedia community is autistic, then it's no wonder that most of this demographic will be male. And it doesn't matter if the rest is more balanced, the autistic people will make the balance lean on the masculine side.

Please tell me if there's anything wrong, it's my first interaction as a member of the Wikipedia force and I fully embrace the fact that I'm a newbie. I like nothing more than constructive criticism, and I'm worried I might have gone too much in opinions and not enough about facts... DitSick (talk) 13:47, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

Not an appropriate venue for this conversation
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
I think this page is well-written and quite useful to read BUT I would very rarely, if ever, feel comfortable linking to it; linking it to an editor who has not explicitly stated that they are autistic is judgemental, inflammatory and likely to cause offense. I think you're talking about Haseo9999, who pointed Sergecross73 to this page, and unless there's some underlying context behind this edit that I'm not aware of, I agree that it was very inappropriate. — Bilorv(talk)(c)(e) 10:46, 5 August 2015 (UTC) Yes, I found it puzzling as well. I don't recall interacting with Haseo in the past, I don't think it says anywhere on his user page that this essay would apply to him, and even if it does, I'm not sure it should be expected of someone to check their user page for this sort of information every time they respond to someone at an AFD. Above all, even if I had known, I'm not sure what I specifically supposed to get from the essay in my case. All I had done was ask for clarification on their stance. I would have asked anyone the same thing. My comment was straight to the point, but not malicious or anything... Sergecross73 msg me 12:41, 5 August 2015 (UTC) I did not know this would cause this much controversy, and for that, I apologize. The only reason I decided to disclose my condition NOW was because when I had made this account I was in a high school that didn't understand Aspergers. At one point the resource teacher said "He can't make friends here". Now IDGAF. Aside from that. I'll point out each and every point I said with clarification. First off, your edit felt like 10 tons of bricks crushing me "Sergecross", and it hurt. Second was the disclosure. I hoped people would understand. Apparently NOT! Third, WP:IAR, which EXPLICITLY states "If a rule prevents you from improving or maintaining Wikipedia, ignore it." Fourth, You are trying to "repair/delete" something that is NOT BROKEN, so don't try to fix it. Fifth, the discussion that started this whole schmozle mess is TWO YEARS OLD. It has now been RELISTED TWICE! Coincidence? I think NOT. Sixth, the IP 84.195.214.118 was right in the thinking and I quote: "Well then, the reason I've found these articles to be useful is that there are no other places that keep track of it, not even the companies that design these softwares. I can't point to any source that has a nice, solid, objective and trust worthy overview of what has been done and has yet to come for any of the for deletion proposed artikel's operating systems. I only know that Sony is keeping track of this but since their Generation 8 website, the information is hard to find and even prior to that, it was never that objective or just flat uninformative, where Wikipedia always did provide some information on what actualy changed (for example, Sony's "The software should now work even more reliable" (or something like that), is on Wikipedia replaced with the issues that got fixed). There is, right now, no place to track these updates better then on Wikipedia. -84.195.214.118 " I even make a note that there's another way of fixing this that does NOT involve DELETION, but rather REVISION: "Maybe there could be a better way of doing the change logs. Maybe we could get together some users who have an interest in these articles to go over the change logs update by update and remove cruft or condense them down to the essential features." Cartakes said and I quote: "as mentioned in Talk:Nintendo_3DS_system_software#About that update history, we could in fact limit the past versions of the systems software to important and/or noteworthy details instead of either keeping or deleting all of them - Cartakes" Which also agrees with my revisionist statement Another point I tried to make was some software changes too much and tracking EVERY revision to a codebase on Wikipedia would be unwieldy (History of Linux, more specifically the Linux Kernel) but some such as History of iOS strike a balance between too much and too little. Firefox, Google Chrome and Android "history of" articles also strike a balance. If we wipe out these articles that were mentioned on AfD in the Xbox One system software article, others will be in danger. We Wikipedians hold the power "of salvation or destruction, at the whim at the user." Guess where I got that quote and I'll give you a barnstar. Thanks for hearing me out, and I'm sorry for the wall of text. Haseo9999 (talk) 23:17, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

Autism as a disability?

I suppose this is more of a philosophical comment. This essay goes to some lengths to stress that autism should not be considered a disability, saying 'please don't equate autism with disability'. Having read it, I can see why: people on the autistic spectrum aren't necessarily 'inferior' compared to neurotypical types, they just have different specialities. But it's arguable that this view comes from a misunderstanding of what 'disability' means, and that it's somehow a pejorative description, which it shouldn't be. Under the social model of disability, autism would certainly qualify; that doesn't mean there's anything 'wrong' with them, it means there's something wrong with society, which is set up in such a way as to put them at a substantial disadvantage. That's the modern approach to disability; understood in that sense, describing autistic people as 'disabled' isn't saying anything negative about them, only about the society that fails to properly accommodate them. Robofish (talk) 14:49, 31 July 2012 (UTC)

That is a good point; in general terms, you're right. The real problem lies with people's attitudes to the word "disability". An awful lot of people who know nothing about autism-spectrum disorders equate all kinds of autism as "severely impaired", in their own minds. There's a bit of a nasty undercurrent of "Auties and aspies are disabled; disabled means incompetent; we shouldn't have to be hand-holding the incompetent here, they should just not be editing if they have a problem", and so on. They're using the word "disability" as a pejorative term when it comes to editing. Sad, but true.

People are much more accommodating of other disorders (such as borderline personality disorder, bipolar disorder, and all the rest), and view them as disorders rather than disabilities. Small change in word, big difference in perception. If we could flick a switch in people's minds and stop them thinking about it that way, there would be a sea change in approach! Pesky (talk) 02:32, 1 August 2012 (UTC)

I have to say I'm far from convinced that the community as a whole is functionally accommodating in a whole host of dimensions to "the other". While many members, probably a substantial majority of members of the community are widely accomodating, the first mover advantage means that people are "getting in trouble" for the most ridiculous things (spelling for example, or failing to provide references), which are lumped under COMPETENCE or IDIDNTHEARTHAT when what is actually needed is to operate synergistically. Moreover those who enjoy causing low level trouble and distress get a free pass if they find a policy based niche under which to do it. Rich Farmbrough, 18:31, 25 August 2012 (UTC).

I don't consider autism to be a disability but I consider autistic people to be disabled. I don't refer to my LGBTness as an oppression. Calling autism a disability implies the disability comes from the autism itself. Here is a quote from one of my heroes Dr. Ross Cooper:

Neurodivergence not being a disability does NOT mean we are not disabled.

Is it pedantic? Yes. I wouldn't get offended if someone said my conditions were disabilities. I just prefer to say "disabled conditions" and not disabilities. Andrea Carter (at your service | my good deeds) 08:38, 22 August 2015 (UTC)

That's right. Saying that autistic people are disabled is not a disparaging remark about them; it is an observation about society, which actively disables people with an impairment (physical or neurological). Within the disabled rights movement, there seems to be a growing usage of this term, which focusses on the disabling society, rather than on the term disability, which focusses on the individual and what they can or cannot do. RolandR (talk) 22:56, 14 January 2016 (UTC)

There may be some autistic people who are not impaired nor disabled, and who are able to function in society like an NT without masking. These are people who have subclinical autism and have a brain structure similar to clinically autistic people. But the majority of autistic people who are correctly diagnosed with ASD (clinically autistic people) are disabled in some way or another. WPEditor42 (talk) 23:47, 19 August 2022 (UTC)

Why is this here

WP:NOTFORUM, WP:NOESSAY — it looks like a user essay written nearly entirely by one user that even goes so far as to link to their talk page, thus WP:NOTFORUM. Even the talk page has entire sections dedicated to communicating with the author.

Proposing WP:USERFY 173.219.77.134 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 20:56, 31 July 2012 (UTC)

It started off as a user essay, and then (on recommendation from other editors) was moved into mainWikipediaspace. I guess possibly that the major reason I'm pretty much the only contributor is that it was basically complete before being moved. Pesky (talk) 02:34, 1 August 2012 (UTC)

If this discussion is still relevant, I would note that this essay is very helpful in explaining the problems related to interaction of A-spectrum editors and the rest of us. The fact that it was written nearly entirely by ThatPeskyCommoner only means that she is good in writing essays; several editors already expressed their endorsement of this essay, and I'm pretty sure that quite a lot of potential proponents are simply not aware of it yet. — Dmitrij D. Czarkoff (talk) 00:17, 14 August 2012 (UTC)

If it still needs to be said, this is a wise essay and deserves its place here. Fiddle Faddle 10:48, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

How we get the tags?

WP:ASPIE WP:AUTIE WP:ASPERGERS WP:AUTISM

AspieNo1 (talk) 08:58, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

Template:Shortcut is responsible for displaying these links on the page. Does that answer your question? --SoledadKabocha (talk) 23:05, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

Specific content areas

This essay doesn't seem to give much guidance on specific types of content, e.g.:

• Aspie editors sometimes add unnecessary information to disambiguations and hatnotes, because their idea of "any possible confusion" disagrees with a neurotypical editor's idea of "reasonable doubt"
• More generally, attempted "uncontroversial maintenance" edits sometimes violate a style guideline and get insta-reverted. The Aspie, with an irrational(?) expectation that everyone will follow 0RR or 1RR, proceeds directly to the reverting user's talk page and then gets surprised when the other user is slow/unwilling to discuss.

Is any of this stuff worth mentioning somehow? This is based on the experience of myself and a handful of friends ... sorry if I'm not explaining as well as I possibly could. --SoledadKabocha (talk) 23:14, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

I forgot to mention that reverted edits can also be due to a misunderstanding of the original research policy. Generally, it can be about article content, not just style. --SoledadKabocha (talk) 17:55, 6 November 2015 (UTC)

I think maybe the first bullet point could go somewhere in the essay as a good example of a situation where the essay might be a relevant thing to keep in mind. I don't fully understand the meaning of the second bullet point. — Bilorv_(talk)^(c)(e) 22:00, 6 November 2015 (UTC)

@Bilorv: Yes, I know I'm about a year late here, but I don't believe in watchlists.

Anyway, to provide the needed clarification on the 2nd bullet: What I meant was that (1) when Aspies see "BRD," they sometimes expect something like BDRD, and they get frustrated when that doesn't happen; also, (2) Aspies may think that 3RR is too lenient a revert rule, and thus they may surprise the other editor by discussing after the first revert. Sorry for my sloppy writing.

As for the first bullet, I sort-of-started an essay at User:SoledadKabocha/essays/Potential vs. actual confusion, but I'm unlikely to satisfactorily finish it any time soon.

Again, this is all based on my personal observations. --SoledadKabocha (talk) 07:58, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Communication

"The ultimate honey-trap" for attracting "high-functioning autistics" - how well put! Wikipedia is what it is, not because of the rules, but because of the many people who have contributed to it. The purpose of the rules is to improve the contributions. I suspect many more would be contributing if they hadn't been put off by editors with robot-like knowledge of the rules, but who are lacking in empathy and communication skills. - Oniscoid 09:14, 23 January 2014 (UTC)

Where now?

I'm just directing a new aspie editor to this page, but I wonder where they can go for further help, given the sad fact that ThatPeskyCommoner (talk · contribs) has not edited in over a year. Is there another aspie-friendly space for them? PamD 08:48, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

offensive

I have aspergers adhd ocd and depression.this article is ableist in the extreme. I am disabled its not a dirty word, and intelligence as some sort of litmus on respect is staggering. So no editors with downs? I cannot belive you used words used to denigrate and humilliate people. I ha e always put my intelligence up as a shield, but to do that is to leave vulnerable those who dont conform to it.178.155.204.92 (talk) 01:02, 2 July 2014 (UTC)

I wholeheartedly agree with user 178.155.204.92. This page is offensive. Could someone put up a page about how to deal with editors who are inner-city educated black people, or how to deal with Chinese editors who are non-native English speakers? This is a bizarre contribution. IAmBecomeDeath (talk) 06:34, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

1- If you are offended by this essay, then you obviously don't get the need for it. 2- If you don't get the need for it, you likely don't have Asperger's or know someone who does. 3- If you don't have Asperger's or know someone who does, why are you reading this essay? 4- Now that we've established you have no need for this essay, feel free to leave this essay and find another. Or perhaps edit an article or two. 5- In case you still haven't figured it out, this isn't an article, but an essay. Here's a link for you to discover the difference WP:ESSAY. -- Winkelvi ● ✉ ✓ 06:49, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

This is defensive, catty, and also not responsive to @IAmBecomeDeath's concern. It is reasonable to ask why we have an essay on how autistic and neurotypical people should work together versus, e.g., Africans, Europeans, and North Americans, all of whom edit here and can have vast cultural and communication differences between them, too. Bulbubly (talk) 01:34, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

I am not entirely sure, because genetics are complex, but there is a genetic factor to autism. No matter who you are, being autist potentially makes you more genetically different than coming from the other side of the world, and gene alteration from autism is targeted at cerebral functioning, which is probably more relevant to this issue than physical differences from genes. It gets even more complex because we have no way to quantify this against cultural differences.

That said, the fact that cultural differences should be given a guide as to how to deal with them shouldn't give less reason for a guide for neurotypical and autistic people to work together.

Furthermore, given that it's an accepted fact that there is a higher proportion of autistic people in the Wikipedia community, it's natural for there to be concerns. And an essay that, guess what essay means (it's french for trying), is about trying to talk about said concerns.

There is a clear-cut difference between neurotypicals and autists. Just to exist, to work properly, we have to remember a bunch of things about how someone works normally. We currently have to adapt because the other way around, people never bother to try to understand us. There is nothing more plausible than someone being aware of this and trying to remediate to the issue in a domain where there is a higher proportion of autistic people compared to the average proportion of autists.

Finally, it's nothing against the idea of palliating for cultural differences. However, I will say that a lot of misunderstandings from cultures aren't objective. I cannot stress how many times I've heard that United States schools are changing facts, especially history: there are even places where they try to deny having lost the Vietnam war because they want to say that they haven't lost a single war. This is obviously not objective, and there's nothing to question. As long as you speak the same language, there is at least a basic level where you understand the same language in the same way.

What should have struck anyone who read the essay is that EVEN using the SAME language, the brain of an autist is centralized on hypersubjectivity. Leaving close-to no place for interpretation or reading between the lines (inference), while social standards make neurotypical ways of building a sentence rife with them. The same language between a neurotypical and an autist can result in completely different understanding of the same sentence. I had trouble answering exam questions in high school because the sentences were so poorly constructed that I couldn't tell what they wanted, and they always pull out the excuse that they can't help a student during an exam so there was nothing I could do. I failed many exams purely because of that. This is how bad it can get. I think there is much more need for a guide to communicate between neurotypical and autistic people than cultural differences, although that's a personal bias.

I don't want to make it sound like I think I'm right, I'm just giving my opinion in good faith. People underestimate the difference there is with an autist and even among autists, because they almost never bother catering to us and we always have to cater 100% to compensate. Understanding requires 50/50, so of course it's hard when you start from a relation where only one side was doing all the work to understand the other.

I believe there isn't as much of a difference between cultures. It still is probably a big issue, but at least you're able to tell from the outside that there is something to be done. It's an alarming indicator that you and many others can't even imagine how bad we need to understand about each other because we're so far apart. DitSick (talk) 14:18, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

Reappropriating shortcuts

I recently created WikiProject Autism, currently as a draft at Wikipedia:WikiProject_Disability/WikiProject_Autism_(draft). I believe this would be a more appropriate target for WP:AUTISM, WP:ASPIE, etc. Can we get consensus on this? Muffinator (talk) 08:57, 12 July 2014 (UTC)

Changing these properly is not easy, changing a shortcut used elsewhere can be highly disruptive. Have you read Wikipedia:Shortcut#Changing_shortcuts? I suggest you make a list of all the shortcuts you want to reappropriate; see how many links there are; confirm whether there's a bot that can automate them; and then start an RFC. Stuartyeates (talk) 21:29, 23 July 2014 (UTC)

Speaking with my WP:WikiProject Council hat on, do you have enough participants to justify a separate project or WP:TASKFORCE? Most WikiProjects fail quickly because of having only a handful of people involved. You might be better off sticking with the larger group. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:03, 23 July 2014 (UTC)

Perhaps a more germane question is whether this is a WP:POINTy fork of WP:MEDRS, or an attempt to establish one. Stuartyeates (talk) 00:12, 24 July 2014 (UTC)

I don't see how WP:POINT or WP:MEDRS are remotely relevant even categorically. Really, this question is as bizarre to me as the notion that the WikiProject may actually be a sandwich and not a Wikipedia page. As far as the WikiProject not having participants, that concern would be better addressed at WP:WikiProject Council than here. For what it's worth, autism is a massive subject with relevance to neuroscience, psychology, sociology, and disability. In addition to editors of those knowledge areas, the project is likely to attract editors who are themselves autistic and thus known for their obsessive diligence and commitment to tasks. Muffinator (talk) 00:44, 24 July 2014 (UTC)

It doesn't really matter how big or important the subject is. If you don't already have several people who agreed to work together, then (a) you do not have a WikiProject by definition and (b) creating pages is a waste of your time. The model of "build it, and they will come" has been repeatedly disproven with WikiProjects. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:50, 31 July 2014 (UTC)

I've agree with Muffinator's proposal so long as all of the necessary precautions are taken to prevent disruptions. Coinmanj (talk) 03:51, 10 August 2014 (UTC)

Aspies and honesty/integrity

I'd love to see something added to this essay about the commonality among Aspies and those with high-functioning autism and honesty (sometimes being honest to a fault). It's extremely frustrating and hurtful to those of us on the spectrum to be accused of lying or being intentionally disingenuous here in Wikipedia. Here's just one online article (out of several to be found) on the subject: [1]. -- Winkelvi ● ✉ ✓ 22:25, 31 July 2014 (UTC)

I'd be happy to add that information to the article, as soon as WP:reliable sources can be found for it. Stuartyeates (talk) 23:28, 31 July 2014 (UTC)

This is an essay, not an article. aren't the "rules" looser for essays (why isn't what I provided adequate)? -- Winkelvi ● ✉ ✓ 00:22, 1 August 2014 (UTC)

The piece you link to is an opinion piece on an advocacy site. For the kinds of sources I'm looking for, check WP:MEDRS. Stuartyeates (talk) 00:45, 1 August 2014 (UTC)

This essay is an opinion piece written by an advocate. See where I'm going with this? Nonetheless, I'll look for some sources. -- Winkelvi ● ✉ ✓ 01:02, 1 August 2014 (UTC)

Stuartyeates, 99% of this essay is without sources. Even so, here's on that should fit the bill as a start: [2]. -- Winkelvi ● ✉ ✓ 01:45, 1 August 2014 (UTC)

And another: [3]. -- Winkelvi ● ✉ ✓ 01:48, 1 August 2014 (UTC)

I suspect that Stuart is looking for something more academic in nature, like PMID 22065242. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:08, 1 August 2014 (UTC)

When it comes to ASD, you can't get much more academic and accurate than Attwood and Gray. -- Winkelvi ● ✉ ✓ 02:14, 1 August 2014 (UTC)

When I made my original comment I wasn't paying attention; I thought / assumed that this is was talk page of an article not an essay. My bad. As WhatamIdoing points out PMID 22065242 is an excellent source (one could quibble about it being self-reported; for those without access, the abstract fairly accurately captures the article boyd). As Winkelvi points out, 99 percent of the essay is without sources. Don't I look like a complete plonker. Stuartyeates (talk) 08:06, 1 August 2014 (UTC)

Maybe just 1% of a plonker. :-) -- Winkelvi ● ✉ ✓ 09:50, 1 August 2014 (UTC)

vulgar language

I believe it is unnecessary to use the vulgar language 'dick' within the section 'Dealing with it in the WikiWorld'. I'd like to discuss alternative words. I'd recommend the word 'jerk' which coincidentally the link defining 'dick' as 'Don't be a jerk'. Why can't this just be jerk instead of the vulgar term 'dick'. Children read this site, no need to subject them to such vulgar terms when there are suitably less offensive terms that could be used. Hawtpeppers (talk) 05:53, 11 September 2015 (UTC)

Agreed and done. WP:JERK used to be called WP:DICK which is presumably why that language was used here. Note Wikipedia is not, in general, a child-friendly site, as discussed at WP:AFP. Adrian J. Hunter^{(talk•contribs)} 13:31, 11 September 2015 (UTC)

Lots of things are "unnecessary" in normal life: it isn't necessary to use mobile phones, we could use landline. Wikipedia isn't "necessary", we could use paper-based encyclopedias. Therefore, saying (or believing) something is "unnecessary" does not provide any support for why it shouldn't happen - it is therefore just a meaningless statement. Besides:

Collins English Dictionary - 2004 onwards:

"dick (dɪk ) noun slang 1. British a fellow or person 2. clever dick 3. a slang word for penis ▶ USAGE The third sense of this word was formerly considered to be taboo and it was labelled as such in older editions of Collins English Dictionary. However, it has now become acceptable in speech, although some older or more conservative people may object to its use"

As it is "formerly considered to be taboo" it is no longer taboo and therefore is no longer vulgar. Like I would go into a supermarket and shout out loud "suck my dick!" lol. However, it is all about context. Nonetheless, there's the evidence: it is not taboo and is not vulgar, just that some people wrongly believe that it is. I have, of course, omitted other dictionaries that still mark it as such. Therefore we have no clue and don't know anymore. I don't necessarily think "jerk" is any better: children in some schools may not be allowed to use any name-calling at all in presence of teachers and this would include "jerk". Therefore, the argument about not allowing children to see something would also apply to "jerk" (in the sense of "idiot"). If children aren't allowed to see anything they could not say in class, then it would potentially extend far far wider. Besides, "Wikipedia is not censored" and it therefore isn't for children. "Less offensive" - ha, but it's all subjective is the concept of "offence" and "less offensive" is still offensive and therefore unacceptable for children to see anything that is offensive to any degree at all IMO, if I adopt the approach of the OP. That said, I don't know why the word "dick" should be in this essay, so I will go and have a look at the context if the use is still there. All this has done is repeat the word even more on a talk page anyway, which, on the OP's view, "children read this site" so this talk page, which is part of this site, has increased the alleged harm to them now. And, as regards "subjecting" children to pages that they choose to view, what about myself (an adult)? What about "subjecting" me to an argument that something isn't necessary and shouldn't be here: I don't wish to see that objection, so what about my rights to not being "subjected" to something? Or, indeed, yours in relation to my reply now? If one rule allegedly applies to children and not "subjecting" them to something, it should apply to all and therefore ban all content of any kind that someone somewhere doesn't want to be "subjected" to (including my excessive quotation marks probably). But that was the word that was used, so shows, IMO, the true end and ludicrousness of the original point. I would say, however, that lots of people, probably the vast majority of populations, appear to continue to believe in a lot of ludicrous or illogical beliefs despite any rationality to the contrary and often seem to believe - or say they believe - things that they were told without challenge. aspaa (talk) 00:48, 23 July 2017 (UTC)

December 2015 recent edits

Ylevental has been making lots of edits to the page, mainly trying to insert the word "some" into every other sentence and putting disclaimers on the article. Their sarcastic, rude and mostly incoherent vandalism here clearly shows they have no intention of editing constructively here, but I think their sentence "However, Autism can only be legally diagnosed by a licensed professional.", following a link to an online test, should remain in that paragraph somewhere. Pinging @Ylevental and Bishonen, the two users who have objected to Ylevental's edits (the latter here) and therefore might disagree with me. — Bilorv_(talk)^(c)(e) 20:50, 29 December 2015 (UTC)

Bilorv admittedly I did go too far in trying to show why the generalizations were ridiculous in my opinion and I apologize, but I seriously think there should be some sort of disclaimer Ylevental (talk) 20:53, 29 December 2015 (UTC)

Why should there be a disclaimer? Your current justifications within edit summaries are:

• "Facts and reasoned arguments, as to why autism is a terrible thing" (apparently a justification to add bizarre non-sequitur references to Gamergate and Bernie Sanders, along with a bunch of sarcastic, highly offensive jokes about autists and some kind of irrelevant paragraph about how two people apparently think neurodiversity is a good thing when limited in scope)
• "reducing generalizations" (a description of actions, not a reason)
• "The content in this essay does not apply to everyone on the autism spectrum, and this should be m..." (incomplete sentence, presumably cut off by the character limit in edit summaries) — Bilorv_(talk)^(c)(e) 21:04, 29 December 2015 (UTC)

The following, "However, Autism can only be legally diagnosed by a licensed professional", if included, should -- in my opinion -- be written as follows: "Autism, however, can only be legally diagnosed by a licensed professional or a group of licensed professionals". -- WV ● ✉ ✓ 21:08, 29 December 2015 (UTC)

That assertion would surely need a geographical limiter. The legal situation will not be the same under every jurisdiction. RolandR (talk) 23:09, 14 January 2016 (UTC)

Student Interested in Wikiprojects Autism

My name is Grace and I'm a student at American University in Washington, DC. I am taking a class on Wikipedia and I was wondering if you know why the Wikiprojects Autism has gone inactive.

As an outsider looking in I know that the statistics and terminology in the field of Autism are constantly changing. With the prevalence rates of Autism increasing, shouldn't the public be interested in the topic now more than ever?

What has been your experience working on the Autism-related pages?

Gr3524a (talk) 16:52, 8 February 2016 (UTC)

Clarification / more specificity needed?

I refer to these words: "A-spectrum editors can appear (to neurotypicals) to have seriously sub-standard levels of language and interaction processes"

It seems to me this can be interpreted in many ways, some not intended by this essay, depending on the experience and temperament of the reader. Also some of the 'language and interaction processes' of any WP editors may violate of site policy, either editorial or behavioral policy.

So I wonder whether this point can be clarified and made more specific so that it is has more of a practical tone and can be used as a touchstone or metric with respect to real-life WP situations and behavior. Thoughts? SPECIFICO talk 14:04, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Demotion

I'm curious how many editors think this essay is representative of their own opinions. I'd prefer to see this userfied unless Wikipedians think this is accurate. Chris Troutman (talk) 02:49, 13 January 2017 (UTC)

I'm somewhat troubled by the subjectivity of this essay, particularly in light of the complexity and technical nature of the underlying phenomena. SPECIFICO talk 03:04, 13 January 2017 (UTC)

I strongly oppose any attempts at demotion or demolition. It is better than many other essays and fits in well among them. Though I agree that it needs quite a bit of work before it is made a policy or guideline. Endercase (talk) 19:49, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

Spammy test?

The link in the first paragraph to "do the test" does not lead to a test result on completion of the questionnaire but to the web site of a consultancy, with information regarding bookings. Surely this is neither useful nor appropriate. Doddy Wuid (talk) 14:43, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

Inconsistent

This website is inconsistent. It uses the British/Canadian spelling of "fibre" in this article, whereas, on another article, the American spelling was preferred because that is where the website is based? I think the other article was the article on the "Scissor Sisters" music group, from memory. Therefore, wondering whether to be consistent and change "fibre" to "fiber". aspaa (talk) 00:35, 23 July 2017 (UTC)

Merge discussion

FYI

 – Pointer to relevant discussion elsewhere.

Please see: Wikipedia talk:Obsessive–compulsive disorder editors#Merge near-duplicate essays
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  10:22, 12 July 2018 (UTC)

Computer metaphor

Please take out all that nonsense. The linked (!) reference clearly states: "Your brain does not process information, retrieve knowledge or store memories. In short: your brain is not a computer." A brain is a brain, a car is a car, a toothbrush is a toothbrush! Bikkit ! (talk) 10:47, 14 May 2019 (UTC)

misplaced on the essay

Science and Nature Journal looks like a solid and relevant source with a good reputation. I think we can rely on it more than the others for this article. Nice research! AnubisBarba (talk) 19:56, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

Cognitive bias, arguing, consensus

There is nothing on cognitive bias in autism-spectrum in this text, and that could be very important aspect in arguing process in discussions. How autism-spectrum editors relate and react on cognitive bias, how persuasion works and how effective could be in achieving consensus and maintaining contact and communication, how non a-s should understand this and how should they react, and so on.--౪ Santa ౪^99° 16:57, 29 November 2019 (UTC)

y'all: this article needs to be taken down

Functioning labels ("high functioning") are no longer used by professionals (including the DSM); in fact, they haven't been in use professionally for years. These labels are scientifically invalid. They are also ableist and deeply offensive.

The section about the brain is also highly, highly unscientific; full of mistakes, basically.

Further, all major autistic self-advocacy groups are fully engaged as DISABILITY rights movements. Having one Wikipedia writer say we're "not disabled, just different" doesn't change that.

This can't stand. It's full of misinformation, inaccuracies, conjecture and stereotypes. Please take it down. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Barryc25 (talk • contribs) 06:58, 30 December 2019 (UTC)

Hello, Barryc25. This is not an encyclopedia article, and it is not a policy and it is not an official guideline. It is an essay that reflects one editor's opinions. It was written seven years ago by an editor who has been inactive for six years. If you disagree with this essay, you are welcome to write your own essay that makes different points. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 08:36, 30 December 2019 (UTC)

Obviously necroposting here, but IMHO Barry raises valid concerns. I mean, yes this is a simplified essay about someone's opinions, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't polish it to be more reflective of fact. Firestar464 (talk) 02:21, 3 November 2022 (UTC)

The original post asked for this "to be taken down" and you did not engage with that fact. Since you're new, I point you to WP:SOFIXIT. In my opinion, if one does not agree with an essay then there is no fixing it. We typically have essays of opposing viewpoints when the cabal allows differing viewpoints to be expressed. Improve this essay as you like. Chris Troutman (talk) 02:39, 3 November 2022 (UTC)

About using terms like giftedness, autism, high-functioning/low-functioning autists, etc... All these terms are questioned for their inaccuracy. IQ is a lie, there is no such thing as an intelligence stat. IQ stands for intellectual quotient, but its origins are discrimination in the United States against immigrating people who wanted to be soldiers. It was a pop quiz at first, but we've progressed a lot since that. Still, intelligence isn't something you can measure. What an IQ test measures is the reactiveness of your brain. Guess what symptoms giftedness includes? Less sleep time needed because your brain transfers data from your hippocampus to your long-term memory faster. Having faster reflexes. All the tests are about how reactive your brain is to different circumstances, which generally results in higher "computationability" of the brain. The term intelligence generally designs the aptitude to provide results that require brain activity primarily, while IQ is the base for doing such actions. There's much more in between both of them, so they're totally different things.

I've seen some angered opinions about the use of these terms in this article. However, you should discern between using a term as discrimination and simply using the official term because it is the official term. No matter how I hate the fact that people hold IQ as a universal measure for intelligence, I will still use IQ in the right circumstances because I know that I am aware of what IQ is. People using "autistic" as an insult with the meaning of "idiotic" isn't ever supposed to change the real meaning of the word. I was known as the nerd in high school, reading books in the front row while the teacher was explaining their class. I heard some girls in my class once call another "autistic" as a cognitively pejorative term. I went up to them and said "Oh, yeah, speaking of autistic, I just got my diagnosis for being one". Guess what? They were kind of shocked and just stared at me, but I've never heard them say it ever again. If you want to change these things, it's possible to take action. Just, please, just don't go around claiming that something like using autism is offensive. Maybe you care that it's a terminology that has a vague stronger connotation towards a disease or something that misrepresents autistic people. However, it was the official term for this conditional difference (I don't know anymore what synonym I can invent for being autistic) at some point in time. It's extremely hard to follow all the new things that people consider offensive because of some vague third-level correlation. I'm not justifying it per say, but you should be aware that it's unreasonable to expect of everyone to follow these things. You can reach out to the person who wrote it, and simply notify them for the sake of informing them. If they continue, then you can at least assume that they are doing it intentionally. However, even at that point, maybe this person just doesn't care that deeply or has other concerns and didn't fully register it.

So, even after reaching out to inform someone of the newly-found way to not upset people (until it upsets someone inevitably), you have at best a coin flip of a chance to get mad for the right reason if the person didn't precise their intentions. The fact that you would jump straight to getting mad is close to insanity or political self-righteousness. DitSick (talk) 14:24, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

The "test" (again)

Someone noted above that the test is spammy. I have additional concerns. I realize that this is an essay and not an encyclopedia article, but it is a part of Wikipedia and thus has implications. We need some very clear caveats at the link. It's not really a "test"; it's a questionnaire. Even the best diagnostic, well-researched tools for ASD determination cannot be used alone to make a diagnosis. Suggesting that a spammy questionnaire on a website can do it has the potential for harm; remember, Wikipedia does not give medical or related advice, and that includes diagnoses. As an analogy, if one of our articles had a link to a "test" for a medical condition, it would be of great concern to many editors, including those at WP:WikiProject Medicine. (Please note that in no way am I trying to equate ASD with any medical conditions or disabilities; it's an analogy). At this point I'm not suggesting that we remove the citation and link to the "test" (although I am not opposed either), but I think we need some cautions inserted with the citation. Thanks. Sundayclose (talk) 16:44, 12 August 2020 (UTC)

I confirm that most tests are a joke, especially online. The best example I can give is IQ: having followed one in its entirety, I can tell you that they NEED a follow-up of three times spaced by 1-2 weeks in-between according to the procedure. They literally have one test to examine your short-term memory (they give you something you have to replicate on the first meeting) and on the second one, they'll ask you to replicate what you can still remember of it, and again on the third meeting for mid and long-term memory. You can go look for any IQ test on the internet and it's so obvious that they're the spammy unprofessional types. None of them will ask you for the follow-ups necessary to evaluate different types of memory, you just spend a few minutes spamming puzzles and others and they'll give you a so-called IQ score based on your results.

At best, IQ tests online are straight-up incomplete. And they never even reach good, let alone this "at-best".

There are many more alarming details about any type of online tests for diagnosing anything. I've seen some about harry potter and the 4 factions of their school, but most of them if you just know anything it's so obvious which answer gives you brownie points for which faction. Oh you decide to let the hamster be a roadkill? You'd never guess you gain a point for the evil faction... Or you save it? Hey, it's a secret but it's a point for the benevolent one...

One of the biggest giveaways of spammy tests is if you can just read something about it and you can guess what you have to do or answer to get a result. It should be extremely hard to target something in a test and get the desired result.

Anything that has to to with auto-persuasion is extremely worrying. I have the detailed report for the IQ test and I can tell you, there's nothing like those personality tests online. There's no subjective opinions that give you fake compliments no matter what result you get. If you perform poorly in an area, they're using detailed metrics they took to explain why you did poorly, and same goes for whatever your result was: they just give an objective report because that's what it's supposed to be.

Lastly, specifically for an autism test: there's no way they're doing that online. I went for a public evaluation, nothing like a fancy private institution. They were two examiners in front of me to avoid having biases or developing attachment towards one specific individual, and another one behind a camera to avoid looking at me for roughly the same reasons but more complex. They even had to record it, according to the procedure, to watch it later and make sure that they were evaluating it objectively.

Some of the tests included trying to make you sympathize in specific ways: one of the examiners told me a story about her past, that she encountered a bear while in her car and got scared. They verify how you respond to that, if you sympathize or just listen to the story, and other more subtle details. Apparently, it's a sign of autism to just listen to the story because a neurotypical person will feel an emotion connection on the moment from imagining themselves in this situation, and transposing their feelings that they'd want to get recomforted in such a situation. For an autistic person, it's a past story (a common misconception is that autists don't have compassion, while they just have compassion differently). It's in the past, it's been dealt with, and the autistic person sees the person in front of them telling the story just fine. There's no need for exuberant shows of sobbing and whatnot. If there was a story that still had repercussions, an autist would be just as able as anyone to recomfort the person or find solutions. They just don't engage in fake recollections of past happenstances for the sake of reliving past emotions, in good or in bad. If it has no more effect on the present day, an autist will prefer developing new feelings and new experiences, that kind of thing.

It's literally impossible to build a connection like that over an online test, and even less probable to accurately analyze the person's reaction. And it's not even worth talking about choice options, because you can so easily fake your answers, or just misunderstand your own reactions. DitSick (talk) 14:53, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

This article does not speak for me.

I’m Ginger! I’m 29 years old and I have autism. Not Aspergers, not high or low functioning autism, just...autism.

Can we talk about how the term ‘high functioning’ and functioning labels as a whole are harmful to the autistic community? Trying to separate ourselves from autistics who need more support by saying we are ‘high functioning’ serves no other purpose other than to invalidate the challenges of others. There is no medical term that indicates function as a scale and there is no standard of function by which to measure a person. It’s not a real tool and should not be used within our community. This article gave me a great deal of frustration because it consistently speaks of high functioning and aspergers as separate groups and speaks as though Autism is not disabling in any way. Autism is disabling for everyone who has it in some way or another.

It causes challenges that neurotypical people do not face and forces us to change the way we interact with the world in order to live in it. Comparing it to different hair and eye color is a slap in the face to those of us who have fought every step of the way to survive in a world not made for us.

I can type. I can talk. I can drive and carry on an conversation. I have an IQ of 144 and read books faster than most while still retaining information. I still need help cleaning my house and remembering to eat and take my medicine. Am I high or low functioning? My friend is non-verbal. She needs assistance feeding herself and going to the bathroom. She communicates with a keyboard and has an average IQ. However she never forgets when she has appointments and keeps a regular schedule that she remembers to the tee. Is she high or low functioning?

Is high and low functioning measured by intelligence or by a persons ability to care for themselves physically?

This sort of separation is just another way of hate keeping within the autistic community and is harmful to those of us trying to bring awareness and advocate for all autistics.

Autistic people may act inappropriately. We do not always understand social cues and may say things that we think are fine or even factual but may hurt someone else’s feelings. Saying that ‘People on the autism spectrum need to be aware that pulling the "Oh, but I'm a poor misunderstood person with autism or Asperger's" card out of the pack is a bad move!’ is a very generalized statement that targets those who may simply not have been taught what is considered ‘tact’. Many autistic people also are not good at conveying tone through text. No autistic person should have to hide who they are, and they certainly shouldn’t have to feel like they cannot explain themselves. Most of us appreciate honesty and are quick to apologize if what we say hurts others. Saying we are Autistic is not an excuse, but rather an explanation for what we did not realize was inappropriate behavior.

“An editor on the autism spectrum who has suddenly had one of their Important Facts taken away from them can be as badly affected as a child who's just been told that there is no Santa Claus, or as a neurotypical who's just been told that their house has been burgled.”

This statement infantilizes Autistics and makes us sound like children throwing tantrums. We are, in fact, capable of handling the truth. While some of us may not understand the tone that is used or may even go hard in the talks to defend our position, this does not amount to a tantrum or some sort of cognitive dissonance moment where we have a meltdown because something was taken away.

This essay was a bit narrow minded in my opinion. I would highly encourage you to learn more about the autism community as a whole and why we don’t need labels like these and how we can work together to advocate for all of us. HopefullyGinger (talk) 03:36, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

@HopefullyGinger: thanks for your comments on this topic. This essay (article is a technical term for a front-facing page) was written by a self-described "high-functioning autistic" person but doesn't reflect either the Wikipedia community as a whole or, of course, autistic people as a whole. Some essays mirror the view of almost all people in the Wikipedia community but others—like this one—are written by a minority of people and just present one of many possible perspectives. Some neuroatypical people identify with the "high-functioning" label while others, like yourself, find it counterproductive. You're welcome to write your own essay with an opposing view. — Bilorv (talk) 22:19, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

The high functioning supposedly refers to intellectual ability, social skills, and taking part in society. But as you mentioned that's not static, and is situational. I have relatives whose ASD caused severe social anxiety, which caused selective mutism at school, and a refusal to do any tests. They were clever, but the teachers didn't realize it, and they needed time to find their place and people. IQ is also a really crappy way to measure people in general, and can cause people great distress as society has this high IQ = success idea. I find it more relaxing interacting with the ASD community, although we can be as annoying, or even more so. than the general population, because we miss the signals to stop.

The article didn't advocate that "autistic person should have to hide who they are";I am fine with both the essay, and your comments. There is a similar divergence of views on main (main) articles on autism, so I avoid editing there as a consensus is near impossible, and I think these may in part be caused national cultural differences.

In Australia for instance, we haven't had the US ablist debate, which I think is about whether society should change, or whether ASDers can/want to/will as they get older/should change to be more NT (Although ABA exists and is very controversial). We also can have more support for kids with things like hypeflexibility/speech/coordination/academics/social anxiety, and an attempt at adult financial support,

In Australia, the term HF autism is not used that much. but I can understand about the concerns with high functioning autism, as it is similar to my friends with Borderline personality disorder who resent the Borderline as a judgement on their humanity. Based on the people I know, the most common words in Australia used are aspies (which is not seen as related to Asperger the person, and not even confined to the old DSM's Asperger's diagnosis part Autism), ND and being on the Spectrum. Personally, I like aspie and ND and ASDer, and dislike autist,

PS In Australia, you would be stirred/ribbed more for being/called a Ginger. And with forgetting to take your medicines, there are medicine boxes that trigger reminders. I use google home instead. Wakelamp d[@-@]b (talk) 06:44, 9 December 2022 (UTC)

Supportive community

There are some researches on supportive / positive ecosystem for ASD folks, which could be hinted and cited within this page.

• Robledo, Jodi; Donnellan, Anne M. (2016-11-03). "Supportive Relationships in Autism Spectrum Disorder: Perspectives of Individuals with ASD and Supporters". Behavioral Sciences. 6 (4). doi:10.3390/bs6040023. ISSN 2076-328X. PMC 5197936. PMID 27827873
  • Provides a triangular model of Trust, Support, Unity

Yug (talk) 07:20, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

Example for the part about "hiding" information if leaving things for inference.

On one of the sections, it says to not avoid including information that you hope that others will infer. And that if you do, an A-spectrum person will think that you are hiding something from them. I'd like an example for that entry to get a better idea of what that would look like. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:6C4E:1200:1E85:10CF:627A:ACF0:5728 (talk) 02:04, 30 April 2022 (UTC)

Is it controversial to say most editors have ASD traits? Any studies?

Is there any study or reasearch on ASD amongst editors, to support the essay's statement that it's a a much higher percentage than the general percentage (1 to 5 %)?
Based my personal experience with people IRL ( my ASD, and that of the people I know), MOST editors remind me strongly of the way the ASDers that I know, and of the different ways they present. Some of my friends would also the least likely to take part in any survey.
So, is it controversial to say that most editors may have ASD? In many Australian workplaces (IT/research/parts of medicine - pathology. radiology, many specialities/electricians), it would cause very little concern.
Wakelamp d[@-@]b (talk) Wakelamp d[@-@]b (talk) 05:12, 9 December 2022 (UTC)

The source just under says it, autists are more lone wolves than anything else, and still they are very present in this community. The proportion is obviously even higher than it seems, but it's also the reason why it's basically impossible to calculate it. Why would this type of people bother to answer any kind of survey? They're not in the Wikipedia community so that they can answer people's curiosity about stats like that, so it would be extremely hard to get it from inside.

I don't really want to say it, because it's two years old, and I'm not sure if it's still ongoing, canceled or what happened to it in the meantime. I'm going to share it for the form of it, but it's nothing official. It was a Canadian research on, well, exactly that, and my friend has been tipped off about the numbers. It wasn't complete, but it came from someone taking part of it. They mentioned probably 90% of Wikipedia articles being written by autistic people. Sorry that it's probably not exactly what you were searching for, and it's only about articles being written, so maybe it's just that, with autistic people having much higher productivity potential than your average neurotypical, it's probably because autists write more articles than the rest of the community. And it's nothing reliable, I have no source to give you. I've searched for this information for quite a while outside of that hint and still, I couldn't find anything so I'm pretty sure that there's no definitive answer.

I still feel bad about only giving a half-ass response, but I figured it might be the only lead there is on the matter so I shared it anyway. DitSick (talk) 15:09, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

In fact, Wikipedia may not be for people with high-functioning autism and Asperger's

They have a hard time collaborating with others.

They don't know how to talk to people. They are sometimes obsessed with a certain thing or point of view and do not want to change that.

This includes me. This is why I quit editing Wikipedia years ago. 183.88.83.222 (talk) 15:04, 5 October 2023 (UTC)

You make a strong point. All we can do is to work with the people we have. 🇺🇦 Fiddle^Timtrent Faddle^Talk to me 🇺🇦 16:13, 5 October 2023 (UTC)

I heavily disagree. There are people with autism that have a heavy obsession with certain subjects or presenting and archiving information. I am sure they constitute a substantial percentage of editors in Wikipedia and if it were not for many of them, Wikipedia would not be as nice and tidy as it is now. They may act immature but that is the reason this essay was written, to spread awareness for neurotypicals on how to act when interacting with them (although a bit vague for my taste). SmallerClown (talk) 19:21, 19 December 2024 (UTC)