Might Explain a Few Things...

Your Aspie score: 116 of 200
Your neurotypical (non-autistic) score: 76 of 200
You are very likely an Aspie



Take the Quiz.


At Barnes and Noble today, I happened across a children's book titled All Cats Have Asperger's, and picked it up. It was short enough that I read the whole thing in the store. Essentially, it seems to be aimed at kids who either have Asperger's Syndrome or who have friends/siblings/etc. with Asperger's, to help them understand what's going on. What struck me, though, was that a lot of the described traits seemed very familiar. So I searched for an online quiz, mostly to satisfy my own curiosity.

Here's a shorter one. On it I scored 31, which is just below the listed threshold of 32.

So there's a good chance I have a mild version of Asperger's Syndrome. Funny thing is that I mostly feel relieved to know that there's a reason for some of the disparity between what I experience vs. what the majority of the population seems to.

As an interesting side-note, I think I would have scored higher before I started teaching and before I started doing taiji. To teach, I had to overcome some of my aversions related to being surrounded by lots of people, and taiji took care of a lot of my physical awkwardness. Some of the other questions related to habits that I had consciously worked to overcome, too.

One odd question that I had to answer "no" to: "Do you tap your ears or press your eyes (e.g. when thinking, when stressed or distressed)?" I almost answered "yes," except that I tend to tap my chin, lips or mouth, not my ears or eyes. You know how most kids count on their fingers when they first learn? I counted by tapping my chin. So I think that, for the spirit of the question, it would have been accurate for me to answer, "yes," but not for the question as actually phrased.

And one last thing... They say people with Asperger's are "overly literal" about figurative language. I've always assumed this to mean that they don't understand the symbology. However, I generally understand the symbology and choose to be overly literal instead, mostly because it amuses me to do so. I have no idea where that might fit into the overall spectrum.