Tag Archives: take a test Tuesday

Asperger's Tests

The One Where We Ask Our Own Questions

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In a comment on last Tuesday’s post, Lori from A Quiet Week in the House had a great suggestion: “A thought for your Tuesdays–could you poll your readers? I love reading about other’s perceptions, strengths, and areas of concern. It might be a good way to help others discover coping skills.”

So what do you think, readers? Shall we have a poll?

Wait, before you answer that, let me share something with you that I’ve been wanting to say for a while now. For me, one of the most enjoyable things about blogging is reading your comments. I don’t just mean the “this is great” aspect of the comments, though of course that feels good. More than that, I enjoy when you share your experiences.

I’m just one person. Though I do a lot of research, I write from a very personal perspective. When you read what I’ve written and then share how something affects you, it’s incredibly valuable, not just to me but to everyone else who comes along and reads the post and the comments.

And lots of people do read the comments. What we’re doing here–and I really do mean we as a group–is creating a rich, detailed account of what it means to be an autistic adult. We’re learning from each other and we’re creating something for the hundreds of silent readers who find this blog looking for information on some subject or other.

The Poll

So, the poll. Do you have a question you’ve always wanted to ask other autistic people? It could be something practical like, “how do you cope with _______.” It could be something you’ve noticed in yourself and wonder if others experience. Maybe you’re curious about favorite special interests or stims or stim toys. Maybe you have a tough thing you’re facing in life and want to know if others have dealt with it in the past.

Here’s what we’ll do:

1. Leave a comment on this post with your question(s). You can post more than one question and I’ll try to include everything, but I don’t want the survey to be too ginormous for us to answer.

2. I’ll collect the questions into survey format.

3. I’ll post the survey next Tuesday and we’ll answer then. I want this to be fun and not a lot of work, so let’s plan to answer as many or as few questions as we want. No pressure.

There are two ways I can set up the survey:

  1. If you prefer to answer anonymously, I can create a Survey Monkey survey that we can answer without revealing our identities. I can then bring the answers back here in the form of a post, with all answers kept anonymous. We may get more answers this way. 
  2. I can post the questions and we can answer in the comments. We may get more trustworthy answers with this option and we’d be able to ask follow-up questions (within reason, of course).

Let me know which option you prefer. Majority rules.

Anything I’m missing? Mostly, I want this to be fun and informative and not like homework for you.

ETA: Don’t be shy about adding more questions. If there end up being a lot, I can split them up over two or more weeks to keep things manageable.

Asperger's Tests

Taking the Famous Faces Test

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This week I took the Famous Faces, which tests for prosopagnosia or faceblindness.

Prosopagnosia, commonly known as faceblindness or facial agnosia, is an impairment in the ability to recognize faces. Although there isn’t a lot of research to support a conclusive link between ASD and prosopagnosia, some degree of faceblindness seems to be common in people with Asperger’s.

Some of the signs of prosopagnosia:

  1. Failure to recognize a friend or family member, especially when you encounter them unexpectedly
  2. Tendency to remember or recognize people based on their hairstyle, gait, voice or other defining non-facial feature
  3. Relying features like hair style/color, facial hair or eyeglasses to recognize people you know well
  4. Failure to recognize people out of context
  5. Failure to recognize yourself in the mirror or in photos

I have all of these except the last one. If my daughter changes her hairstyle or I haven’t seen her in a while, I won’t recognize her right away. I locate my husband in a crowded place by the way he walks, what he’s wearing or his voice.

I rarely recognize people out of context and have actually said to more than one person, “Sorry, I didn’t recognize you out of context.” And that was before I knew anything about faceblindness.

For now, I’ll leave the background on faceblindness short because in researching this test, I found enough information for at least one more post.

Measuring Prosopagnosia

I’ve seen three different types of tests that “measure” prosopagnosia. One is a famous faces test which removes hair and other identifying features from the faces of famous people, requiring you to identity them by facial features alone.

Another type of test shows a series of faces and asks you to identify which of them belong to a set of 20 faces viewed at the start of the test. I took one online (sadly it’s no longer available) and came out in the bottom 20% of scores. My poor working memory probably didn’t help.

Finally, there is a type of test that digitally alters a face and asks you identify what is “wrong” with the face or which face among three (1 altered and 2 not) is different. This measures your ability to recognize “normal” vs. “abnormal” facial structure, a task that is easier for people who aren’t faceblind.

For example, can you tell at a glance what is wrong with two of the three faces below (answer in the caption):

The face on the left has closer-set eyes and the face on the right has a raised mouth. The middle face is unaltered. (Barton et al, 2004)
The face on the left has closer-set eyes and the face on the right has a raised mouth. The middle face is unaltered. (Barton et al, 2004)

All of these tests obviously have flaws. A better test might be a series of questions based on the list of prosopagnosia traits, but that doesn’t seem to exist. There is a visual test that is supposed to be accurate at diagnosing prosopagnosia but it’s more time-consuming–we can take that one if folks are interested.

Taking the Test

You can take the Famous Faces test at Test My Brain. Choose it from the list of available tests, agree to the terms and answer the short demographic survey. There are 20 celebrities to identify–it took me about 10 minutes to finish but some of the faces I needed to study for a while, trying to picture them with varying hairstyles, before I could come up with a guess.

Scoring the Test

I did well, but my results may have been influenced by the fact that I’ve taken this test before.

I scored slightly above average but I had an advantage because I've taken the test before.
I scored slightly above average but I had an advantage because I’ve taken the test before.

The first time I took Famous Faces, I thought George Clooney was Sean Connery and I mistook Nicole Kidman for Rosie O’Donnell. This time around I got George Clooney right but still missed Nicole Kidman. I also got Angelina Jolie, David Beckham, Fred Astaire, John F Kennedy Jr, Uma Thurman and Susan Sarandon wrong. If the photos had included hair I probably would have missed Uma Thurman, Nicole Kidman (because most blonde white actresses look alike to me) and David Beckham (unless his tattooed torso was included!).

The Bottom Line

The reliability of using famous faces tests to actually diagnose prosopagnosia is poor, but a low score may be indicative of some degree of faceblindness. If there’s enough interest, I’ll hunt down and do a write up on a more reliable test that’s used for clinical diagnosis of prosopagnosia.

Asperger's Tests

Taking the The Systemising Quotient (SQ)

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This week for Take a Test Tuesday I took the revised Systemising Quotient (SQ-R) test.

Systemizing refers to the drive to understand, construct, predict and/or control the rules of a system. Simon Baron-Cohen, in his desire to wedge autistics into his extreme male brain theory, contrasts systemizing with empathizing as the two primary ways in which humans make sense of their worlds.

The basic premise of the extreme male brain theory is that neurotypical males are better at systemizing and neurotypical females are better at empathizing. Hence, brains can be classified as either male or female according to these aptitudes. Autistic males and females are both better at systemizing, therefore, autistic people have “male brains” and autism is a condition of extreme male neurology.

Using that logic you could also make the case that female basketball players have “male bodies” (i.e. male bodies are on average taller than female bodies, female basketball players have taller bodies on average than females in general, therefore, female basketball players have “male bodies”).

Setting aside the extreme male brain theory, what can we learn from the SQ? The SQ is the subject of several research papers and each time the data show people with ASD generally scoring lower on the EQ and higher on the SQ.

The SQ attempts to measure systemizing in daily life, asking questions about how organized you are when it comes to your financial records, collections or favorite books/music. While the creators tried to avoid introducing bias in terms of subject matter, the test is still vulnerable to this. For example, I want to know the specs of new computer because that’s a topic I’m fairly familiar with.

I’m less interested in the specs of my car’s engine because that’s a subject I know (and care) little about. The same goes for knowing the species of animals and trees or the make-up of committees and governments. Those aren’t subjects I find highly interesting so regardless of how much of a systemizer I am, I’m only going to have a passing curiosity about them

Much of this still relies on personal interests, though perhaps it balances out in the end. The questions about how I bag my groceries and what my closet looks like made me laugh. I bag groceries by type because that makes them easier to put away at home. I hang my clothes in the closet by type so I can find what I’m looking for quickly.

My theory about systemizing? It all comes down to the fact that when you’re autistic, systemizing isn’t simply a preferred way of thinking, it’s a survival mechanism. Without systems and routines, we’d be constantly getting lost in the details.

One final note before we take the test. A lot has been written about gender bias in the EQ and SQ. It struck me as very telling that when the SQ was revised to remove some of the questions that were in “traditionally male domains” and add more questions that might be relevant to females, they removed questions related to investing, religion and culture and added questions related to shopping, cleaning, music and clothing.

Taking the Test

You can take the SQ-R (2005 revised version of the SQ) at the Aspie Tests site. Click on The Systemising Quotient (SQ) link and follow the prompts to get to the test page. I’m assuming you know the drill by now. There are 75 questions and you’re required to choose among strongly agree, slightly agree, slightly disagree and strongly disagree. Positive “strongly” answers score two points and “slightly” answers score one point. Possible scores range from 0 to 150.

It took me a little over 10 minutes to complete.

Scoring the Test

I scored an 85. Not surprising. I’m super organized, have a good memory for details and am insatiably curious about how things work.

I don’t think the SQ is binary in the way that EQ is. For example, on the EQ a positive answer to “I get emotionally involved with a friend’s problems” suggests empathizing. A negative answer suggests remaining detached or perhaps taking a logical problem-solving approach to the friend’s problems. This could be roughly construed as systemizing if we continue to look at it in a strictly binary way.

On the SQ, a negative answer to “I do not follow any particular system when I’m cleaning at home” suggests that one prefers using a system for housecleaning. But what does the opposite answer suggest? Certainly not anything to do with empathizing.

However, the EQ-SQ model sets the two tests up as “complementary” and goes so far as to demonstrate that a composite of EQ-SQ scores is steady across all groups (i.e. my EQ+SQ will be relatively equal to yours and everyone else’s, across all neurotypes). That suggests a strong negative correlation between the two tests.

When you look at the relationship between the AQ, EQ and SQ, it becomes evident that both the EQ and SQ act as a sort of proxy for AQ scores. In other words, they aren’t tests of empathizing and systemizing so much as they’re tests of the traits of autism. Of course autistic people will score higher than average on a test that asks a lot of questions closely related to core autistic traits and lower than average on a test that asks a lot of questions about social skills.

For reference, here are the mean scores from the 2005 SQ-R study:

ASD Male 77.8
ASD Female 76.4
ASD Total 77.2

Typical Male  61.2
Typical Female 51.7
Typical Total 55.6

(I prefer looking at the means from the original studies because the means provided by the Aspie Test site are based on self-reported neurological status, which may not be accurate.)

The Bottom Line

The SQ is an interesting measure of how dependent an individual is on routine, systems and categorization, but the use of the SQ as “proof” of the extreme male brain theory is highly suspect.

Asperger's Tests

Taking the CAM Face-Voice Battery

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This week for Take-a-Test Tuesday I took the Cambridge Mindreading Face-Voice Battery (CAM) which is another test of the ability to recognize emotions in others.

The Cambridge Mindreading Face-Voice Battery (CAM)  tests recognition of complex emotional states. It consists of short audio and video clips in which actors convey 1 of 20 different complex emotions through either their voice or their facial expressions.

The theory behind the CAM is that autistic people are able to read basic emotions but have difficulty interpreting complex emotions. Basic emotions are the ones that we learn early in life: happy, sad, angry, surprised. Most people learn these by age 6.

Complex emotions are sometimes described as combinations of basic emotions or as basic emotions plus cultural conditioning. They include mental states like stern, intimate, guarded, admiring, submissive and vibrant. There are hundreds of complex emotions and it takes us years to learn them. Generally, most people can recognize the majority of complex emotions by the time they reach adulthood.

Robert Plutchik's Wheel of Emotions is one of many ways of thinking about the relationships between basic and complex emotions
Robert Plutchik’s Wheel of Emotions is one of many ways of thinking about the relationships between basic and complex emotions

According to the CAM creators, the emotional states presented in the clips are “higher order” emotional concepts:

  • 6 concepts from level 4 (concepts understood by typical 15–16 year olds)
  • 13 concepts from level 5 (understood by typical 17–18 year olds)
  • 1 concept from level 6 (words understood by less than 75% of typical 17–18 year olds)

The purpose of the test is to examine whether autistic people grasp these more complex emotional states. It includes both negative and positive emotions as well as subtle and intense emotional states. Each of the 20 emotions is repeated 5 times.

Taking the Test

The Face-Voice Battery has two parts. Part 1 consists of listening to 50 short clips of actors saying a phrase or sentence. You’re given 4 options for describing the emotional content of the clip. Part 2 consists of watching 50 3-5 second videos of actors silently portraying facial expressions. Again you’re given 4 options that describe the emotional content.

You can take the Cambridge Mindreading (CAM) Face-Voice Battery at aspietests.org. To begin, click on the The Cambridge Mindreading Face-Voice Battery – Part 1 (Voices) link. After entering your age and diagnostic status and accepting the terms, you can proceed to the voice clips. As you take the test, keep in mind that speed counts. In addition to a %-correct score, the test returns an “average time to answer” score. Part 1 took me about 10 minutes to complete.

Once you finish Part 1, click the “back to the homepage” link and then click the Cambridge Mindreading Face-Voice Battery – Part 2 (Faces) link to begin Part 2. Again, speed counts. This part took me about 10 minutes to complete as well.

Scoring the Test

I did well on this test–in fact, I matched the mean score of neurotypical females in the original research study. Here is my score:

You scored 90.0% in 5.7 seconds. Faces: 84.0% (42 correct) Voices: 96.0% (48 correct)

Here are the average scores from the study:

ASD Faces task: 32 correct (64%)
ASD Voice task: 35 correct (70%)
ASD Total: 68 correct (68%)

NT Faces task: 44 correct (88%)
NT Voice task: 43 correct (86%)
NT Total: 86 correct (86%)

I’m not surprised by how well I did on the voices portion of the test. “Voice data” is my primary means of reading social situations. It helped that the informational content of the phrases matched the emotional content of the voices. For example, when I heard “that is horrible” I took into account the information being conveyed by the statement as well as the tone of voice to settle on my choice of “appalled.” This is considered a “strategy” by the test creators, so basically, once again, I’m “cheating.” But it works, so hooray for adaptations.

The video clips were a mixed bag. I think I did better on the ones that had a dissimilar set of possible answers (i.e. appalled, vibrant, blank, or intimate) and the ones that I remembered to glance at the answer choices before the clip played.

As an experiment, for some trials I watched the clip and tried to form an answer before looking at the choices. On one video, I was certain the answer was “sarcastic” but that wasn’t one of the choices; I think the correct answer was “reassured.”

A few other random thoughts:

  • Am I the only one who thought most of the voice clips sounded like they were straight out of Dickens novel?
  • The use of live action videos is more realistic than static photos, but I still didn’t feel like the test results were reflective of my real life ability to read emotions.
  • I liked seeing the contrast in my voice vs. facial expression reading skills.
  • Some of the video clips made me incredibly uncomfortable to the point that I had to glance away.
  • I couldn’t find any data on the “time to answer” scores. From background reading about this type of test, I know that researchers often use the average time to answer as a metric to gauge competency. The assumption is that the longer it takes to answer, the more processing your brain is doing to produce an answer.

The Bottom Line

CAM feels more realistic than Reading the Mind in the Eyes, but it’s still far from an accurate test of the fluid way that emotions present in real life interactions.

Asperger's Tests

Taking the Friendship Questionnaire (FQ)

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This week I took the Friendship Questionnaire (sometimes called the Friendship Quotient).

The Friendship Questionnaire (FQ) was developed in 2003 as part of Simon Baron-Cohen’s ongoing quest to prove his “extreme male brain” theory of Asperger’s. Consequently, the FQ measures a very specific model of friendship to prove a point about people on the spectrum.

The developers of the FQ say that an individual will score highly on it if they:

  • enjoy close, empathic supportive friendships
  • like and are interested in people
  • enjoy interaction with others for its own sake
  • find friendships important (Baron-Cohen and Wheelwright, 2003)

The questions are based on assumed gender differences in forming friendships. The FQ developers hypothesized that NT women would score highest, with men scoring slightly lower than NT women, and ASD individuals of both genders scoring significantly lower than NT men.

The average FQ scores from the 2003 study were:

  • NT females: 90.0
  • NT males: 70.3
  • ASD females: 59.8
  • ASD males: 53.2

The fundamental basis for the gender-difference hypothesis seems to be that men and people on the spectrum prefer activity-based friendships. Neurotypical women, on the other hand, are assumed to prefer interaction-based friendships, where the act of connecting is of primary importance.

Since every friendship I’ve had as an adult has grown out of a common interest, it’s safe to say I fall into the activity-based preference. Honestly, I have no real idea how friendship works in most cases, so let’s take the test.

Taking the Test

You can take the FQ at the Aspie Tests website. Click the link for the Friendship Quotient and then complete the first three questions (you don’t need to create an account unless you want to) and click the submit button to start the quiz.

There are 34 multiple choice questions.

I found some of these questions hard to answer because there was no “neither” option. For example, on #6 I literally don’t have a wide enough social circle that it requires me to choose between asking someone to meet first or thinking of an activity then choosing a person to do it with. #9: I have no idea. Neither? Why is there no neither option?!

For some questions, I ended up choosing answers based on how I’ve interacted with friends in the past because I couldn’t come up with a current example to base my answer on.

Scoring the Test

After submitting your answers, you’ll get your FQ score. The possible scoring range is 0 to 135. I got 39.

Average scores by gender for the FQ (aspietests.org)
Average scores by gender and neurotype for the FQ (aspietests.org)
FQ score distribution by neurotype
FQ score distribution by neurotype (aspietests.org)

I’m not sure what to make of my 39. I’m not surprised by it. Going down the list of qualities that the FQ tests for:

  • I enjoy close, supportive friendships, but I don’t need more than a couple at a time to feel that I have supportive connections in my life.
  • I don’t really like or have an interest in people as a general rule (sorry, human race).
  • I don’t generally enjoy interaction with others for its own sake, which is different from not enjoying interaction with others at all.
  • I find friendship moderately important, but again I don’t need many friends to feel like I have a satisfactory level of social interaction in my life.

The Bottom Line

The research I read on the FQ doesn’t imply that a low FQ score is “bad”, which is good to see, because I think the FQ is testing for a very specific model of friendship. The research does say that those with low FQ scores tend to have high AQ and low EQ scores.

Asperger's Tests

Taking the Alexithymia Questionnaire

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This week for Take-a-Test Tuesday we’re taking the online alexithymia questionnaire.

Alexithymia refers to people who have difficulty identifying and describing emotions as well as differentiating between physical and emotional sensations. It’s not a formal diagnosis, but a way of describing a common set of experiences related to emotional dysfunction.

Some descriptions of alexithymia also include impoverished imagination and a tendency toward externally oriented (concrete) thinking. I found it interesting that both studies I cite below omitted these last two characteristics. Many of you who commented on the emotional dysfunction post last week questioned the inclusion of impoverished imagination, saying that you personally felt the opposite was true. I have to agree with this. My imagination is, if anything, overactive. Perhaps there is an autistic subtype of alexithymia?

Alexithymia is extremely common in autistic individuals. About 50% of people diagnosed with ASD have severe alexithymia, however nearly all people on the spectrum experience it to some degree. Among the general population, about 10% fit the alexithymia profile and parents of autistic children are more likely to be alexithymic than parents of nonautistic children.

When it comes to social communication, the line between autistic traits and alexithymic traits is blurry. Two recent studies (Bird et al, 2010 and Silani et al, 2008) suggest that alexithymia, not ASD, is responsible for impaired affective empathy.

The 2008 study looked at brain activity in autistic and nonautistic people with and without alexithymia. It found a correlation between a person’s level of alexithymia, brain activity in one of the regions believed to be responsible for identifying one’s own emotions, and scores on an empathy questionnaire. This was true of both the autistic and nonautistic participants, suggesting that impaired processing of emotion, not autism, is the source of impaired affective empathy.

The brain uses the same neural pathways for perceiving and interpreting our own  emotions as well as the emotions of others, so it makes sense that if we cannot process our emotions easily, we’ll also struggle to process emotions demonstrated by others..

One question that remains unanswered is why autism and alexithymia occur together so frequently.

Many commenters on last week’s post recognized themselves in my description of my own emotional dysfunction, so I thought it would be interesting to take the Online Alexithymia Questionnaire. While not a clinically recognized measure of alexithymia, it is based on commonly used clinical screening questionnaires.

Pros and Cons of the Online Alexithymia Questionnaire

Pros

  • Self-scoring
  • Provides subscale scores with cutoffs
  • Overall score is presented on a simple visual “severity” scale
  • Includes questions phrased as self-observation (I feel . . .) and other observation (People tell me . . .)

Cons

  • Not clinically tested or validated
  • Unclear how cutoffs were derived
  • Includes questions on topics that are not a part of generally accepted alexithymia definition

Taking the Test

The alexithymia questionnaires used in clinical research (TAS-20, BVAQ) aren’t available online, so I took the Online Alexithymia Questionnaire (OAQ-G2).

Take the test here. There are 37 questions. You have to answer at least 20 to get a result, meaning you can skip any you find overly invasive. The answers for each question become “grayed out” once you make a selection but you can go back and change your answer if you want to.

Scoring the Test

When you’re satisfied with your answers, click the “Evaluate Test” button and you’ll be given an overall score as well as 7 subscale scores. Here are mine:

Test Results: 141 Points.
Alexithymia: You show high alexithymic traits.

The yellow area indicates "some alexithymic traits" and the orange area indicates "high alexithymic traits"
The yellow area indicates “some alexithymic traits” and the orange area indicates “high alexithymic traits”

Difficulty Identifying Feelings: 23 Points <15 – 18> high alexithymic traits

Difficulty Describing Feelings: 17 Points <10 – 12> high alexithymic traits

Vicarious Interpretation of Feelings: 13 Points <8 – 9> high alexithymic traits

Externally-Oriented Thinking: 29 Points <18 – 21> high alexithymic traits

Restricted Imaginative Processes: 19 Points <18 – 21> some alexithymic traits

Problematic Interpersonal Relationships: 29 Points <15 – 18> high alexithymic traits

Sexual Difficulties and Disinterest: 11 Points <10 – 12> some alexithymic traits

The subscale scores in parentheses appear to be equivalent to the yellow area on the slider bar, meaning “some alexithymic traits.” A score below the range in parentheses indicates the absence of alexithymic traits (green area) and a score above indicates high alexithymic traits (orange area).

Keep in mind that the last two subscales, problematic interpersonal relationships and sexual difficulties/disinterest, aren’t specifically part of the formal definition of alexithymia. It’s possible that the sexual difficulties subscale could be impacted by whether a person is in a long-term relationship and feels comfortable with their partner.  Also, externally-oriented thinking and restricted imaginative processes are not always included in clinical definitions of alexithymia. The first three subscales are the best gauge of the core deficits of alexithymia.

I was surprised by my score on externally oriented thinking. This item refers to a tendency to think in concrete, nonintrospective terms. I don’t view concrete and nonintrospective as synonymous, but that could be my autistic brain.

I think in concrete terms, but I also spend a lot of time examining my thoughts and feelings. I might spend more time on the latter because I have to consciously “check-in” with my feelings to identify them. However, neurotypical people may be spending more time considering their feelings as part of decision making or social interaction. My introspection usually tends toward “what the heck is going on?”

The Bottom Line

The Online Alexithymia Questionnaire is the only freely available alexithymia  test. Although not scientifically validated, it appears to be a reasonable “amatuer” measure of alexithymic traits and a useful starting point for better understanding how you process emotions.

Asperger's Tests

Thinking on your Feet: A Trio of Cognitive Tests

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Thinking on Your Feet is a new test at Test My Brain. I was planning to do the creepy Face in the Branches test today but it’s no longer available. Instead I took Thinking on Your Feet, which isn’t an Asperger’s test but does test some of the cognitive areas that can be impacted by ASD.

Thinking on your Feet consists of three short tests:

  1. Find the flickering dot: You’re shown a set of blue and yellow dots that flash intermittently and you have to find the dot that’s changing color. There are sixteen sets of dots.
  2. Visual working memory: You’re briefly shown a set of four shapes arrayed around a plus (+) sign. The set disappears and one shape reappears. You press “s” if the shape is the same as the one you saw in that position in the set and “d” if it is different. There are 42 sets of shapes.
  3. Visual reasoning: You’re shown a matrix of shapes and have to identify the “missing piece” from 5 possible choices. There are 35 matrices and they become increasingly difficult.
Example of a nonverbal reasoning matrix
Example of a nonverbal reasoning matrix

As I was taking the tests, they reminded me of some of the cognitive tests I took during my Asperger’s evaluation.

The first and third tests measure components of executive function: attention and working memory. Executive function is way of describing our brain’s command and control center. It encompasses things like planning, problem solving, and verbal reasoning as well as starting, stopping, switching and monitoring tasks. Many aspies, including me, have impaired executive function.

The second test–visual reasoning–relies on nonverbal reasoning. Many aspies excel at tasks requiring nonverbal reasoning, either because they think visually or are skilled at pattern recognition.

Working with those general assumptions, individuals on the spectrum are probably more likely to score above average on the second test and average or below average on the other two.

Taking the Test

First a warning: One section of this test has a set of colored dots that flash at a steady rate. The flashing isn’t rapid, but the dots are quite bright and you have to study them as they flash to find one that is different. Is this sounds like it may be uncomfortable or triggering for you, don’t take this test.

The test guidelines say it takes about 30 minutes to complete. I finished in a little over 20. The first and third tests go pretty quickly, but you may want to spend more time on the visual reasoning section, depending on how quickly you can solve the harder puzzles and how much you care about your score.

When you’re ready to give it a try, go to the Test My Brain site and click the Go! button next to the Thinking on Your Feet test. You’ll be asked to agree to the consent form and provide some demographic information (age, handedness, primary language, etc.) to help the researchers analyze the data they’re collecting via these tests. It’s all anonymous and you won’t be asked for any personally identifying data.

Before each section of the test, you’ll be given written directions as well as two practice trials to be sure you understand what to do. After the three tests are complete, you’ll be asked for your SAT scores. If you don’t remember them or never took the SAT you can skip this section. It has no impact on the results you receive.

Scoring the Test

You’ll get three separate scores. Here are mine:

Find the Flickering Dot:  I got 14.63, which is a measure of the average number of screen flashes it took me to find the dot. The average score on this test is 20.53.

My scores on the Find the Flickering Dot test
I scored better than 30% of other test takers

Visual Reasoning Test: I got 31 out of 35 correct. The average score is 25.76

My visual reasoning score is in the 90th percentile group
My visual reasoning score is in the 90th percentile group

Visual Working Memory: I got 37 out of 42 correct. The average score is 33.91.

My visual working memory score is better than 60% of the other test takers
My visual working memory score is better than 60% of the other test takers

If we assume that the scores are normally distributed, then scores that fall between the 25th and 75th percentile are in the average range of ability. Or to put it another way, if your blue guy is standing somewhere in the middle of the pack, your scores are average. If he’s standing in the first two or last positions, you’re above or below average.

For the flickering dot and visual working memory scores, my blue guy is standing in the middle six, which means I have average scores . On the visual reasoning test, my blue guy is in the second to last position, meaning I have an above average score.

I went back and looked at my ASD evaluation report to compare the results of the comparable cognitive tests with these and they’re quite similar. My scores were above average for perceptual reasoning and average for attention. I didn’t take a visual working memory test so I don’t have a direct comparison there. I did take two verbal working memory tests and my results were “impaired” on both, meaning my little blue guy was standing in the first position in line.

It’s no surprise to me that I scored better on visual working memory than verbal. My verbal cognitive test scores are poor across the board and I’m much more comfortable working from printed or visual material than from oral directions.

The Bottom Line

This set of tests is an interesting look at some of the cognitive elements that are thought to be ASD strengths and weaknesses.

Asperger's Tests

Taking the Empathy Quotient Test

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This week I took the Empathy Quotient (EQ) test. I know many of you have been waiting for this one. Next week we’ll do something less technical and more fun, but this week, I’m gonna hit you with a lot of background info. The EQ and the 2004 study that it was originally used in created a firestorm of controversy that never really died down.

The Empathy Quotient (EQ) test is intended to be a measure of your ability to understand how people feel and to respond appropriately. The questions on the EQ are based on the following definition of empathy:

“Empathy is the drive or ability to attribute mental states to another person/animal, and entails an appropriate affective response in the observer to the other person’s mental state.” (Baron-Cohen and Wheelwright, 2004)

This definition encompasses both cognitive empathy (perspective taking/attribution) and affective empathy (emotional response to another’s emotional state). Although many autistic people have described distinct variations in their perceived levels of cognitive and empathic empathy, Baron-Cohen and Wheelwright state that cognitive and affective empathy are too difficult to untangle and therefore must be looked at as a whole.

A subsequent 2005 study by Muncer and Ling challenged this belief by sorting 23 of the 40 EQ questions into three domains: cognitive, emotional reactivity, and social skills. To give you an idea of what types of skills fall into each domain, here are the top 5 most relevant questions for each:

Cognitive

  1. I can tune into how someone else feels rapidly and intuitively
  2. I am good at predicting how someone will feel
  3. I am quick to spot when someone in a group is feeling awkward or uncomfortable
  4. I can easily work out what another person might want to talk about
  5. I can sense if I am intruding, even if the other person does not tell me

Social skills

  1. I do not tend to find social situations confusing
  2. I find it hard to know what to do in a social situation
  3. I often find it difficult to judge if something is rude or polite
  4. I find it difficult to explain to others things that I understand easily, when they do not understand it first time
  5. Friendships and relationships are just too difficult, so I tend not to bother with them

Emotional reactivity

  1. I tend to get emotionally involved with a friend’s problems
  2. Seeing people cry does not really upset me
  3. I really enjoy caring for other people
  4. I usually stay emotionally detached when watching a film
  5. If I say something that someone else is offended by, I think that is their problem, not mine

The 2005 study tested the 23 domain-specific EQ questions for gender differences. The emotional reactivity domain had the greatest gender differences, the cognitive domain had fewer differences and the social skills domain showed no differences in scores along gender lines. The authors theorized that emotional reactivity may be strongly rooted in the “willingness of an individual to express emotion” (drive) rather than the ability to understand another person’s emotional state.

This raises the question of how alexithymia (emotional dysfunction), which affects many people on the spectrum, might impact EQ scores. Many people on the spectrum experience alexithymia, making them less willing or able to express emotion due to challenges in regulating and processing feelings. Perhaps it isn’t that autistic people can’t understand the emotions of others, but that the cost of responding appropriately is too high.

Gender Bias Revisited

If you’ve been following Take-a-Test Tuesday closely, you’ve seen the discussion of gender bias in other screening instrument studies. The EQ study was heavily weighted toward males, with 65 males and 25 females in each group. That’s more than twice as many males as females in a study of a trait that is known to have gender differences in scoring.

Traditionally males score significantly lower than females on self-reported measures of empathy. On top of that, the EQ study had significantly more control group women than men with above average scores (>54) and 14% of control group males in the EQ study scored in the AS/HFA range.

Now consider that this study was used to test:

  • whether adults with high-functioning autism (HFA) or Asperger’s Syndrome (AS) have lower EQ scores
  • whether the EQ is inversely correlated with the AQ (i.e. the “more autistic” you are, the “less empathetic” you are)
  • whether the EQ inversely correlates with the Friendship Questionnaire (i.e. the “more autistic” you are, the less reciprocity and intimacy you’ll report having in relationships)
  • for sex differences in empathy

Baron-Cohen used the low EQ scores of the HFA/AS group as support for his theory that HFA/AS is an “empathy disorder.” The researchers subsequently conducted interviews with many of the HFA/AS study participants and reported that while they had difficulty knowing that their actions hurt another person, they did feel bad about it when such instances were pointed out to them, and therefore “are not like unfeeling psychopaths.”  (As I write this, I’m envisioning the tops of my autistic readers’ heads flying off. Repeatedly. Sorry.)

This study is also used as evidence to uphold another of Baron-Cohen’s theories (extreme male brain theory), further calling the motivation of the study design into question.

So, now that we’ve gotten ourselves all worked up about the questionable science underlying the EQ, let’s actually take the darn thing.

Pros and Cons of the EQ

Pros

  • Self-scoring
  • Scoring of slightly/definitely choices is weighted
  • Filler questions attempt to reduce repetitiveness
  • Clinically tested in both ASD and non-ASD populations

Cons

  • Measures cognitive empathy, emotional reactivity and social skills but doesn’t provide subscale scores
  • May be gender biased
  • May exhibit bias toward developer’s theory of autism
  • Probably longer than it needs to be (a 15-item version has shown similar outcomes)
  • Self-reported measures of empathy often have poor correlation with tests of empathic accuracy (i.e. we tend to think we’re either more or less empathetic than we are)

Taking the Test

When you take the EQ, you may question the relevance of some of the items. That’s because 40 are related to empathy and 20 are filler questions meant to be a distraction from the repetitive nature of the empathy questions. Only the 40 empathy-related questions count in the scoring; the 20 filler questions score a zero no matter how you answer them.

You can take the test here. There are 60 questions. Unlike some of the other tests we’ve taken, this test gives 2 points for a “definitely” answer and 1 point for a “slightly” answer so degree matters.

Scoring the Test

Possible scores range from 0 to 80. The average NT scores from two different studies were 47 and 50 for women and 41 and 42 for men. The average aspie score is 20.

A general scoring guideline:

  • 0-32 = below average
  • 33-52 = average
  • 53-63 = above average
  • 64-80 = significantly above average

I got a 12. The Scientist got a 48. I’ve taken the EQ twice in the past, and got an 8 and a 10. I jokingly told The Scientist this past week that I’m now 50% more empathetic.

If you get a ridiculously low score on this test, keep in mind that it’s measuring a few different things and conflating them into one “empathy” score, which isn’t very accurate. After reading the Muncer study, I wish the test returned subscale scores for cognitive, emotional reactivity and social skills. I’d like to know which of the areas I actually scored some points in.

The Bottom Line

The evidence for the EQ as a unidimensional measure of empathy is weak. Aspies tend to score low on the EQ, but what that means is unclear.

Diagnosis

I Think I Might Be Autistic. Now What?

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Take-a-Test Tuesday has led to some readers realizing that they too might be on the autism spectrum. Their comments nudged me to start writing about a subject I’ve been meaning to tackle: my Asperger’s “origin story” or how I came to realize that I might be autistic and what happened in the wake of that realization.

As usual, I’m mixing personal narrative with a bit of advice based on what I learned from my experience. I hope that other Autistics and those who think they might be on the spectrum will add to what I have to say here by sharing their own experiences in the comments.

—–

So, you think you might be an aspie or autistic or somewhere on the autism spectrum. Now what?

First, take a deep breath. Relax. Nothing’s changed. You’re the same person you were before you took that test, read that article or had a lightbulb go off while talking to someone about autism.

I remember my first inklings that I might be an aspie. I was listening to an NPR story about David Finch, the author of The Journal of Best Practices. His first hint that he had Asperger’s was an online quiz that his wife asked him to take because she recognized so many aspie traits in him.

As they described the quiz questions, for the first time I realized that Asperger’s Syndrome is more than social awkwardness and that I’m more than painfully shy. The symptoms that stood out most for me were the ones I’d never known were “symptoms” of anything other than my personality: attachment to routine, resistance to change, special interests, a need to be alone. Down the list I went, nodding and thinking yes, yes, yes, ohmygoshyes.

I went in search of the Aspie Quiz and what really blew me away were the specific behavioral questions: Have you been accused of staring? Yes! Do you tend to talk too loudly or too softly? Yes! Do you have difficulty filtering out background noise? Yes!

How had I not seen this before?

now-what

I’d heard a similar interview with Finch back in 2009. Interesting, I’d thought at the time, but nothing more. I’d read quite a bit about autism, because I was drawn to the subject. It never occurred to me to ask why. I’d taken the Autism Spectrum Quotient AQ test several times in the past. Every single time I scored above the cutoff for being on the spectrum. Every single time I told myself that it was probably a fluke, or even more improbably, that most people likely scored that high.

For years I’d tiptoed around the subject of autism. Finally, at 42, I was ready to explore the possibility that I was autistic.
Processing your First Contact with Asperger’s or Autism

  • Nothing has changed; everything has changed.
  • Know that no matter how it feels right now, this can be a positive realization.
  • If you’re on the spectrum, learning more about what that means can help you understand yourself better and learn to cope more effectively with the challenges that an Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) presents.

Next Part in the Series: Paths to Realization and Is this Me?

Asperger's Tests

Taking the AQ-10

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A few weeks ago I took the Autism Spectrum Quotient (AQ) test. In the comments on that post, Nat who you can find on Twitter at @quarridors, mentioned that there is shorter version–the AQ-10. This week for Take-a-Test Tuesday, I took the AQ-10. If you’ve taken both the AQ and the AQ-10, check out my note at the bottom of this post.

The AQ-10 is a condensed (10 question) version of the AQ test. It’s relatively new, and was developed based on a 2011 study involving 1000 people with ASD and 3000 neurotypical controls.

Though the AQ-10 is much shorter than the AQ, according to the 2011 study, it has a similar predictive power. There are some concerns about the AQ-10 study–like the original AQ study, it consisted almost entirely of adults with Asperger’s Syndrome, making it hard to generalize the usefulness of the AQ or AQ-10 for autistic adults who aren’t aspies. There is also a gender disparity in the groups, with about 60% of the control group members being female and about 54% of the ASD group members being male.

The AQ-10 is used as a screening tool for adults in the UK, to identify people who may benefit from receiving a comprehensive autism assessment. The developers of the AQ-10 have emphasized the greater practicality of a 10-question screening test, which can easily be completed as part of typically brief primary care doctor visits.

Like the AQ, the questions on the AQ-10 are drawn equally (2 questions each) from five domains:

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

It’s interesting to note that the 10 questions with the best predictive value on the short versions of the AQ for adults, adolescents and children were all the same except for one. The developers of the test point to this as evidence that autistic traits are relatively stable across a person’s lifespan. Think about that for a moment.

Pros and Cons of the AQ-10

Pros:

  • Very brief (10 questions)
  • Clinically tested
  • Has similar predictive properties as the 50-item AQ
  • Adult and child versions are available

Cons:

  • Requires manual scoring
  • Limited number and type of questions
  • Lack of subscale scores

Taking the Test

You have to take this one the old-fashioned way, with a pencil and paper. You can find the test in PDF format here but for ease of use (and because there is no automated scoring version available online), I’m going to include the 10 questions in this post as well.

For each of the questions below, choose one of these answers: definitely agree, slightly agree, slightly disagree, definitely disagree:

1. I often notice small sounds when others do not.

2. I usually concentrate more on the whole picture, rather than the small details.

3. I find it easy to do more than one thing at once.

4. If there is an interruption, I can switch back to what I was doing very quickly.

5. I find it easy to ‘read between the lines’ when someone is talking to me.

6. I know how to tell if someone listening to me is getting bored.

7. When I’m reading a story I find it difficult to work out the characters’ intentions.

8. I like to collect information about categories of things (e.g. types of car, types of bird, types of train, types of plant, etc).

9. I find it easy to work out what someone is thinking or feeling just by looking at their face.

10. I find it difficult to work out people’s intentions.

Don’t worry too much about the definitely or slightly designations. Scoring is based on whether you agree or disagree, not on how strongly you feel.

Scoring the Test

Use the following to score your answers (“definitely” or “slightly” get the same score so just focus on whether you agreed or disagreed for scoring purposes):

Question 1: agree=1 point, disagree=0 points
Question 2: agree=0 points, disagree=1 point
Question 3: agree=0, disagree=1
Question 4: agree=0, disagree=1
Question 5:agree=0, disagree=1
Question 6: agree=0, disagree=1
Question 7: agree=1, disagree=0
Question 8: agree=1, disagree=0
Question 9: agree=0, disagree=1
Question 10: agree=1, disagree=0

Phew! Okay, now you should have a number between 0 and 10. The cutoff score is 6. If you score 6 or higher, the doctor in the UK who administered this would then consider recommending you for a full autism evaluation.

One of the things I see over and over in the literature about the AQ is that patients should be referred for an evaluation if they score above the cutoff and are suffering some distress. So if you score above the cutoff and are not distressed by your symptoms, I guess you can go on your merry way.

I scored an 8 (which is very much in line with my 41/50 on the AQ).

The Bottom Line

This is a relatively new, self-report screening instrument.

If you took both the AQ and AQ-10 did you find that your scores were similar?* Did you score significantly higher (or lower) on one than the other? Did anyone score above the cutoff of 6 on the AQ-10 but below the cutoff of 32 on the AQ?

*A quick way to compare your scores is to convert them to a percentage. For example, I got 41/50 on the AQ, which is 82% (41 divided by 50 = .82). I got 8/10 on the AQ-10, which is 80%.