Category Archives: Asperger’s Tests

Asperger's Tests

Taking the “Fear, Anger and Joy” Test

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This week for Take-a-Test Tuesday, I took the “Fear, Anger, Joy” test. It’s not an Asperger’s test, but it does measure something that aspies often struggle with: reading emotions through facial expressions. Also, since the last two tests have been question-oriented, I thought a visually-oriented test might be a nice break.

testmybrain.org is a citizen science project run by Harvard University. The website is used to conduct large-scale behavioral research studies with the goal of developing neurocognitive tests. By taking one (or more) of the tests on the website, you contribute to ongoing research and you also get a nice little write-up about your results, what they mean and why the research is being done.

I like the interactivity of the tests and the novel approach that Test My Brain takes. For example, the test that I’m taking today, “Fear, Anger and Joy,” is a test of the ability to identify emotions in facial expressions. Unlike some of the other facial expression recognition tests out there that allow you to study an expression for an unlimited time before identifying it, this test only allows you to see the facial expressions for a couple of seconds. I feel like this is closer to what happens in social situations, where facial expressions are fleeting.

Pros and Cons of Fear, Anger, Joy

Pros:

  • Automated and self-scoring
  • Better simulates social situations by limiting viewing duration for each set of faces
  • Detailed explanation of scores
  • Results include average scores and percentile ranking so you know how you measure against others who’ve taken the test
  • Explanation of why the research is being done with a link to more info
  • Taking the test contributes to ongoing research

Cons:

  • Test is part of active research so no conclusive results
  • No direct link to AS/autism/autistic traits
  • Forced choice between 2 options equals a 50% chance of being correct when guessing

Taking the Test

This test takes 15 to 20 minutes so be sure you have the time to complete it before you begin. To take the test, go to testmybrain.org and click on the Go! button next to the “Fear, Anger, Joy” test (you may have to scroll down to find it–the order of the tests changes).

You’ll be asked to make your browser window large. I kept mine the size I normally use and it worked fine. The next screen is a simplified informed consent form. You’ll be told what the research is being used for and asked to consent (agree). Once you do, you’re officially a research subject! The next screen collects some demographic information. It’s all anonymous–you won’t be asked any identifying information to get your results or anything annoying like that.

Once you’ve entered your demographic info, you’ll begin the test. There are a couple of practice questions before the first set of faces appears. You’ll see two faces side by side and be asked to identify which is happier, sadder or angrier. There are 56 sets of faces for each emotion. That sounds like a lot until you realize that each set is visible for only a couple of seconds.

After you’ve completed all three sets of faces, you’ll be asked if you encountered any technical problems or if you cheated in any way. Researchers think of everything. Once you confirm that your results aren’t tainted, you’ll be taken to the scoring page.

Scoring the Test

The aim of the test is to evaluate how well people can detect subtle differences in the level of emotion conveyed by an expression. I found the expressions presented at the beginning of each to be obviously different. One face was clearly much happier, sadder or angrier.

As each section progressed, the differences in the expressions became much less obvious and I found myself guessing more frequently. I also realized that scared and happy can look similar to me. The same is true for scared and angry.

Here are my scores (out of a possible 56 on each section):

Which face is angrier?: Your score was 45. The average score is 45.18.You scored higher than three out of every ten people who took this test.

My rankings on the anger section
I scored slightly below average on the anger section.

Which face is happier?: Your score was 54. The average score is 49.49.You scored higher than seven out of every ten people who took this test.

Nearly a perfect score on the happy faces!
Nearly a perfect score on the happy faces!

Which face is more afraid?: Your score was 47. The average score is 43.18.You scored higher than six out of every ten people who took this test.

And a little bit above average on the afraid faces.
And a bit above average on the afraid faces.

I did better than I expected to. I’m not surprised that I score the highest on the happy faces because happiness is (for me) most clearly expressed around the mouth (smiling) and that’s where I most often focus my gaze.

Anger forced me to look at the area around the eyes more and I had to purposely do that. For fear, I quickly found a pattern that helped me: furrowed brows or foreheads. I spent the rest of the “afraid” section looking first (and sometimes only) at the foreheads of both people to see which looked more scrunched up. Maybe I should have confessed to cheating?

Apparently I have trouble taking in a facial expression as a unified whole. I seem to look at the various parts for clues and then try to sum them up.

I also found my perseverative nature kick in when I had to change from finding the angrier face to finding the happier face. On the first of the happy practice sets, I chose the angrier face because that’s what I’d been doing for the previous 58 trials. Oops.

The Bottom Line

This test was fun to take and I felt like I learned something about how I process facial expressions.

How did you do? Were you surprised by the results?

Asperger's Tests

Taking the Autism Spectrum Quotient (AQ) Test

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This week for Take-a-Test Tuesday, I took the Autism Spectrum Quotient (AQ) test. The AQ is used as a clinical screening instrument so in addition to taking the test, I read two of the studies that have been done to validate it. The write up that resulted is rather geeky.

The Autism-Spectrum Quotient (AQ) was developed by the Autism Research Centre at the University of Cambridge and first published in 2001. While the test has “Autism Spectrum” in its title, it’s geared toward identifying adults with Asperger’s Syndrome. It has been tested on adults with normal intelligence who had been diagnosed with AS or HFA*. While the AQ isn’t considered a diagnostic instrument, the 2005 study referenced later in this post did recommend that it be used by family doctors/general practitioners to determine whether to refer an adult patient for an in-depth Asperger’s Syndrome evaluation.

The AQ is composed of 50 short questions, 10 each on:

  • social skills
  • attention switching
  • attention to detail
  • communication
  • imagination

The 2001 study that was used to develop the AQ has some interesting data about the validity of the individual questions. If you’ve always disagreed with the idea that autistics lack imagination or can’t see the point of “the phone number question” on the AQ, you might find the individual item analysis revealing. Go take a look for yourself (Table IV, especially items 3, 8, and 29).

I’ll spare everyone else the gruesome details.

Pros and Cons of the AQ

Pros:

  • Short, can be taken quickly
  • Self-scoring
  • Includes questions phrased as both preferences and perceived competencies
  • Clinically tested (statistical data available on sensitivity, specificity, test-retest reliability, internal consistency, etc.)
  • Adult, adolescent and child versions are available

Cons:

  • Possible gender bias
  • Single score outcome
  • Choice of questions may be biased toward creator’s theory of autism
  • No subscale scores
  • Uncertainty regarding what a mid-range score might mean due to multiple recommended cutoff scores

Taking the Test

There are many places that you can take the test online. I took it at Wired.com. To get started, read the questions and choose one of the four answers for each. Don’t spend too much time agonizing over the slightly or definitely wording. The scoring is based on your choice of agree or disagree with no weight given to how strongly you feel it.

When you’ve answered all of the questions, click the “Calculate Score” button to get your AQ score. You’ll see your score on the next page along with a list of which items you scored positively on. Each positive item (i.e. item that indicates an autistic trait) equals one point, so a higher score indicates the presence of more autistic traits.

Scoring the Test

The possible scoring range is 0-50. The 2001 study found that 80% of people with Asperger’s who took the test scored 32 or higher. A subsequent 2005 study proposed a cutoff score of 26 be used when screening adults for Asperger’s in a clinical setting. The second study found that of 100 people who completed the AQ, the test correctly classified 83% of them as having Asperger’s or not. The 2005 study states that using the higher score of 32 as the cutoff would minimize false positives, so there really isn’t a clear consensus on how useful the midrange scores are.

Here is a graph comparing the scores of people with Asperger’s to the scores of neurotypical controls in the 2001 study:

From “The Autism-Spectrum Quotient (AQ): Evidence from Asperger Syndrome/High-Functioning Autism, Males and Females, Scientists and Mathematicians” by S. Baron-Cohen et. al.

The graph shows a fairly clear difference in the distribution of scores between those with Asperger’s/HFA and the control group. However, it also shows some overlap in the middle of the scoring range. Some people who were clinically diagnosed with Asperger’s/HFA scored in the teens, well below the cutoff of 32, and some neurotypical people scored in the thirties.

The original study also has some interesting outcomes for gender. In the AS/HFA group, the mean score for women was higher than for men, while in the control group, the reverse was true. In fact, the mean score for women with Asperger’s was 38.1 (vs. 35.1 for males) while not a single woman in the control group scored above 33 (highest score for male controls was 37).

Oh yeah, my score was 41.

The Bottom Line

Unless you score at one extreme or the other, you may find this test raises more questions for you than it answers.

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*I used HFA (High Functioning Autism) throughout this post because it was used in the 2001 study to describe the diagnosis of some of the study participants.

Asperger's Tests

Taking The Aspie Quiz

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There are quite a few online Asperger’s Syndrome tests. I thought it might be fun to take each of them and then do a little write up.

So, welcome to “Take a Test Tuesday,” a new series that will go on for as many weeks as I can continue digging up new tests to take.

I’m going to kick it off with my favorite online Asperger’s test, The Aspie Quiz, but first a few words about online tests in general. Although some of the tests you’ll find on the internet are used as part of a diagnostic battery, it’s important to remember than an official diagnosis includes additional elements such as neuropsychological testing, observation by a psychiatrist, an assessment of childhood development and interviews with family members.

While you can take these quizzes and get a result that says you’re “most likely an aspie,” they aren’t diagnostic instruments. A formal diagnosis can only be made by a qualified doctor.

With that in mind, let’s get started.

The Aspie Quiz

The Aspie Quiz was developed by Rdos. It’s been through many revisions over the years, with the addition and subtraction of questions based on, among other things, how well the questions correlate with the answers of diagnosed individuals. If you’re interested in statistics or how tests like this are developed, you’ll love the Aspie Quiz Evaluation page. It has a wealth of information on the rationale for which questions have been included or dropped as well as the correlation between quiz scores and various diagnoses.

The Aspie Quiz is not used in any official diagnostic capacity and is billed as a test to be taken for fun, but you’ll often find aspies quoting their scores in their signatures at places like Wrong Planet. Rdos has also written about how the Aspie Quiz compares to the Autism-Spectrum Quotient (AQ) test, which has high validity as a diagnostic instrument.

The Aspie Quiz is made up of 150 questions that fall into six domains: talent, compulsion, social, perception, communication and hunting. That last category isn’t one you’ll see on any other Asperger’s test. There is a short explanation about the “hunting” questions in the detailed quiz results, tying the questions to cooperative vs. passive hunting traits. However, the explanation also states that the hunting questions have no “diagnostic relation.” The other five domains cover topics more commonly thought of as differentiating aspies from NTs, such as special interests, adherence to routine, and social preferences.

Pros and Cons of the Aspie Quiz

Pros

  • Very detailed
  • Self-scoring
  • A wide range of question types
  • Extensive statistical data available online
  • Results include both Aspie and NT scoring scales
  • Detailed scores in 12 subscales, including scoring rationale
  • Commonly referred to in online Asperger’s communities
  • Visual, quantitative and qualitative results

Cons

  • Longer than most online Asperger’s tests
  • Has not been independently validated in a clinical setting
  • May be biased toward the developer’s own theory of Asperger’s
  • Not officially recognized by medical establishment

Taking the Test

To take the test, begin here. You don’t need to register if you prefer not to. Just click the “I accept” button. On the next screen you’ll see some questions that the developer is using to validate the test items. Select the appropriate answers and click the “Go to Quiz” button to begin the quiz.

There are a lot of questions, but they’re fairly straightforward. It took me about 20 minutes to complete the quiz. Once you submit your answers, you’ll get a basic results page with your Aspie and NT scores as well as a graphical spiderweb representation of your subscale scores.

You can click the “Detailed results suitable for printing (PDF)” link to get a PDF file with your aspie and NT scores, your spiderweb, and a detailed explanation of your scores on the various subscales.

Scoring the Test

You’ll get two scores: ____ out of a possible 200 for the Aspie score and ____ out of a possible 200 for the neurotypical score. The Aspie score tells you how high you scored on items indicative of Asperger’s traits. The neurotypical score tells you how high you scored on items that describe common non-autistic (neurotypical) traits. Based on the combination of the two scores, the final line of the results will state that you’re “likely an aspie” or “likely neurotypical” or that you “have aspie traits and neurotypical traits.”

Here are my scores:

  • Your Aspie score: 170 of 200
  • Your neurotypical (non-autistic) score: 32 of 200
  • You are very likely an Aspie

For comparison, I asked The Scientist, who is neurotypical, to take the quiz. He generously agreed to let me use his results. Here they are:

  • Your Aspie score: 85 of 200
  • Your neurotypical (non-autistic) score: 158 of 200
  • You are very likely neurotypical

Finally, our adult daughter volunteered to share her results as well:

  • Your Aspie score: 77 of 200
  • Your neurotypical (non-autistic) score: 143 of 200
  • You are very likely neurotypical

As you can see, I scored much higher on the aspie items and much lower on the NT items, while The Scientist and our daugther scored quite high on the neurotypical items and lower on the aspie items. I find it interesting that my scores are more widely distributed than theirs.

Obviously there are questions on the Aspie Quiz that are aspie indicators but will be answered positively by NTs. For example, when The Scientist is interested in something, he gets deeply absorbed in it, much like an aspie with a special interest. The same will be true of aspies having some qualities that are more commonly associated with NTs.

The distribution of scores between aspie and NT becomes most obvious when you look at the spiderwebs.

Mine:

My spiderweb results (The Aspie Quiz)

The Scientist’s:

The Scientist’s spiderweb results (The Aspie Quiz)

Our daughter’s:

Our daughter's spiderweb (The Aspie Quiz)
Our daughter’s spiderweb results (The Aspie Quiz)

My high scores fall almost exclusively on the aspie (right) side of the web and my NT family members’ are weighted toward the NT (left) side of the web, with some moderate scores on the aspie side as well.

The Bottom Line

While the Aspie Quiz isn’t an officially recognized test, it does seem to be an accurate reflection of neurotype and you get a pretty picture when you’re done.