
Asperger Syndrome Tied to Low Cortisol Levels - nickb
http://news.yahoo.com/s/hsn/20090402/hl_hsn/aspergersyndrometiedtolowcortisollevels
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amichail
It seems to me that people with Asperger Syndrome have a clear career path:

* they would probably prefer to work by themselves on a computer all day

* they would probably NOT want to climb the corporate ladder in a large company

So, it seems that working on their own computer-related startup would be
ideal. And today, that sort of thing is becoming quite common.

BTW, it's not clear to me that people with this condition would want to be
cured. This "disease" allows people to focus on the task at hand and be more
successful at it.

In fact, we may be seeing evolution at work here as the human race adapts to
the computer age -- at least in certain regions such as Silicon Valley.

~~~
strlen
Don't dwell on idea that certain type of very specific neurological
differences pre-disposes anyone to/from any sort of career/social path or
success.

It's what you know, what you are willing/able to learn and how hard you're
willing/able to work that matters (together with a certain degree of "luck" as
well).

~~~
lunchbox
>It's what you know, what you are willing/able to learn and how hard you're
willing/able to work that matters.

In turn, what causes people to be willing/able to learn and work on certain
things? Our preferences and aptitudes are primarily stored in our neurological
makeup. So neurological differences (whether inborn or acquired) will cause
people to behave/emote differently.

Of course, there will be lots of people with Asperger's who love interacting
with others and enjoy great interpersonal success, but that's the point of a
pre-disposition -- it refers to a correlation, not a hard-and-fast rule.

I don't have statistics for people in the autism spectrum, but I would not be
surprised if they trended heavily toward professions that focused on
intellectual work over interpersonal interaction.

~~~
jlc
I feel certain that people w/ AS trend away from professions like, say, sales.
I feel certain that a large chunk of people w/ AS are knowledge workers for
exactly the reasons given in this thread. But it's worth pointing out that AS
encompasses people w/ a broad range of abilities, and narrowness of focus and
social anxiety are only two aspects of the syndrome. There are often so-called
sensory-integration issues, rigidity, a low tolerance for frustration,
compulsiveness, difficulties w/ executive function, and on on -- all part of,
or concomitant to, AS.

So, I'm just saying, it _is_ a disability, and I expect adults w/ AS also
trend to underachievement. Anybody know a brilliant but difficult person (or
two) delivering pizzas or working as a museum guard or the like? I do.

FWIW, my 5 y.o. has AS, so I've thought about this quite a bit.

------
AutLabs
I actually have Asperger Syndrome and I'm a programmer. I was diagnosed by a
neurologist in 2008 at the age of 34. There are some interesting comments
here. I definitely have seen a few comments from other autistic people on
forums about preferring a "menial" job if it meant they could work more or
less alone. Some would rather be a filing clerk than a manager in the same
department. Many of them do well in academics.

Simon Baron-Cohen has said that their research indicates a link between autism
and systemizing genes. So people who have the systemizing genes are more
likely to enter into professions like math, science and software - which is
part of the reason why autism is more common among math majors, and why you
often see a history of engineering jobs in the family of a person with autism.
[http://www.opposingviews.com/articles/research-scientists-
mo...](http://www.opposingviews.com/articles/research-scientists-more-likely-
to-have-autistic-children)

I wrote up some of my thoughts about this in more detail on my blog here:
[http://ontap.riaforge.org/blog/index.cfm/2009/4/2/AprilAutis...](http://ontap.riaforge.org/blog/index.cfm/2009/4/2/AprilAutism)

I myself am working on raising awareness for an effort to improve the
employment rate of people with autism called Autelligent Laboratories. The
hope is that the business model for this software company can be extended and
reused by companies in other industries. <http://www.autlabs.com>

------
strlen
This raises some interesting questions--

I wonder than if this means Asperger's could at times have been erroneously
diagnosed as GADD/social anxiety? How else does stress/anxiety affect patterns
of cognition and social function?

Would this mean that to the extent it encouraged narrow and driven focus and
to the extent such a focus is beneficial, is anxiety/stress actually helpful
to society? Does this explain (to some extent) success of societies with high-
stress education systems?

Interesting find.

