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Why intelligence scores do not predict success for autistic adults

My nephew had a life-altering opportunity to follow the path of being a "gifted" child. Yet an early age he chose to the contrary to follow a very ordinary life. I still recall how his relatives on both sides of the family fretted over this.

As a result, he is a remarkably well-adjusted and happy man in every sense of the word, and gainfully employed in finance without even having gone to college.

Success clearly means different things to different people. IQ not required.
 
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I'm not sure I'm particularly fussed one way or the other over IQs.

If I want to learn something, I know how to chase that knowledge down and further it if this is my want.

I know I can obsess on a subject or project if I choose to.

A test score won't change my ability to do this.
(Unless I choose to believe the test)
 
Katleya said:
So I was deemed brilliant, but difficult, confrontational, and even lazy.
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Yep... and then add to that "Stubborn", "won't listen-won't respond", "bull headed", "off in his own worldway too much"... Only then to ace a final, and get accused of CHEATING by a teacher that never gave a damn anyway... Who on her on assumptions, and constantly refused to give me the grades I duly earned, and then so graciously "allowed" me to pass her classes one point above failing... It's really hard not to HATE someone like that.

That's when I figured out that IF you don't fit into peoples forums/curriculums/groups/ cults/ or clicks, it makes no difference... you will be nothing either way.

That got into me deep (it still gets too me), and that's when I basically quit caring in school (or in LIFE) about much of ANYTHING (mostly PEOPLE)... She took my grades away, which was like taking part of my future away in school. Just like my mom took my trust away... It's just nearly a trend in my LIFE since I was tiny.

I never cheated, not once, not in any way, but they couldn't figure me out, so they basically discarded me, and then labeled me something I never was, not then, not now.

I figure at some point we all get what's coming to us... Some people better brace themselves... Cause and Affect (or Karma) as it is often called... Will collect what is due with interest, penalties, and often no mercy.

I wont be there with a Smiley Face... I pity these empty meat suits.

It is still this way in schools today - even in Doctors offices, or Psych offices... We have to fit the boxes they need to check off... This guy don't really care anymore about their damn boxes, and world destroying mindsets... : )
 
Catana said:
Pretty typical experience. I can relate to it. Once they know you're intellectually capable of doing the work, they expect you to get on with it. At least that's how it was for me. Maybe that expectation has been modified these days with the ability to recognize and designate a student as doubly exceptional.
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Depends on where you go to school, who your specific teachers and assessor(s) are, and your parents...

I think it is more common to recognize twice exceptional students, but even people who should know better still have a problem wrapping their heads around it because (I think) it is so common to conceptualize ability as fairly one-dimensional (or at least, to conceptualize broad categories of ability -- e.g. "academic" -- as one-dimenstional).
 
LucyPurrs said:
Did the washlet seat you got not work? I think it was you who ordered it or am I remembering wrong?
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It was indeed me. And it works marvelously. I just didn't actually know 4-ply toilet paper actually does exist; I was exaggerating when I first posted about it. But now that I know 4-ply is real I absolutely must try it. I doubt I'll re-order it, but having actually bought and used 4-ply toilet paper is the kind of thing I'll tell my grandkids, I mean, holy sweet bajeesus, it's real :eek:

Man, I've been talking a lot about feces lately, I wonder what Freud would have to say about this.
 
LucyPurrs said:
Neither did my sister but when she started talking it was in full sentences. And now she is a renown psychiatric expert on delirium so far from retarded.
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Why is it seen as such a terrible thing to have intellectual disability (ID), anyways?

Those who don't have ID likely wouldn't want to have it, but the same can be said about people who don't have autism, or anything else that can cause difficulties (even genius can cause difficulties, but most people look at genius like it must be nothing but sunshine and rainbows).....

A lot of us autistics are okay with who we are.....

I, for one, don't want my neurology to be seen as inherently bad even even though it causes significant disability (that doesn't mean I want everyone to think it's inherently good, I just want people to see it as what it is, to set their value judgements aside and realize that maybe I have some things to contribute to the world just the way I am, maybe I'm happy the way I am, maybe being a person like me isn't a terrible thing in and of itself).....I don't want my life or my neurology to be seen as something to wish away, something to dread or to pity.....

.....I imagine a lot of people (not all of them, of course) with ID might feel the same way about being intellectually disabled.
 
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Hi. I'm Echo, and I'm an underachiever.

Sadly, I think "giftedness" masks autism.

I had social issues, but I chalked it up to being different/gifted. I had anxiety and depression and concluded that many other intelligent people seemed to deal with those as well. And, as others pointed out here, the more I didn't live up to expectations, the more anxious and depressed I became.

Then I concluded that all my social issues stemmed from depression and anxiety. And those, of course, were the result of brain-laziness. My fault entirely....

Not exactly solid reasoning, but not discouraged by mainstream thinking in the slightest.
 
Gritches said:
Man, I've been talking a lot about feces lately, I wonder what Freud would have to say about this.
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He would probably say you're full of it!
But, kidding put aside, How Was It?
Was it as soft as an Angora or just a Wipe Out?
:p

@Chance I was always attracted to Einstein and Tesla also. Even as a child.
Not because they were genius' but it's like there was a
soul reason. Hard to explain.
Maybe like a soul connection?
There have been a few other people I have felt this
connection with as soon as I met them or heard about them (as in the case of Einstein/Tesla).
The few in RL had likes, interests and personalities a lot like my own I found out later.
I've always found like attracts like.
 
Gritches said:
Between my IQ and standardized test scores, everyone had such high expectations for me. It wasn't "what do you want to be when you grow up?" it was "so, do you want to be a doctor or a lawyer when you grow up?"

Teachers had high expectations for me. I kept meeting them, and the bar kept getting raised. My parents had high expectations for me; I'm a failure in their eyes now and probably always will be, since I'm pretty much disqualified from doing anything too terribly fantastic.

Thing is, growing up, "exceptional" was quickly becoming the new "average". I had no idea in my little head that college was optional, and my parents were already picking schools for me when the teachers were still putting gold star stickers on my homework.

Point is, everyone else thought they knew what I needed to be happy, and they thought that happiness and achievement were the same thing. How wrong they were.
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I fell to the same kind of pressure, and started studying medicine right after I graduated. I dropped out after two years.
 
Some jnteresting posts on intellectual disability and giftedness and how problems were always ignored.
I always called i the cassandra complex
Cassandra (metaphor) - Wikipedia

A bit like the myth.

Telling the truth about yourself in this world, yet never being believed.
Doesn't make it easier.

I gave up about 11.
School - what's the pass mark? How many do you need to get a job?
University - same. 60 for course work, 40 for the exam needed.
My strategy:
5 questions. - complete 3. Go home. Nearly 100% marks for completed questions...

But its not just about passing is it?

There's a social thing to a high mark.
A conformist,thing kind of.
I had a bad attitude, apparently.
They failed me on one exam as I did revision for another one on the paper.
'They dont like that'
But I didnt need that subject to get the qualification, so up yours !
 
I agree that intelligence quota scores don't predict success.

I don't know what my IQ is because unlike most people here, I was never tested formally. My primary school thought I needed extra tuition because I was gifted, the middle school thought I needed extra tuition because I was unintelligent and/or had learning difficulties, and wanted to put me in a special slow learners' class. Go figure! It was on my parents' insistence that I was kept in the same class.

I believe my IQ to be at least average, or above average, otherwise I probably wouldn't have gone to univesity.
 
the_tortoise said:
https://spectrumnews.org/opinion/viewpoint/intelligence-scores-not-predict-success-autistic-adults/

This quote does not reflect the main point of the article, but it reflects a perspective that iI wish more people shared (emphasis mine):

It is important to recognize that better assessment and a greater focus on skill-building will not eliminate adaptive functioning difficulties among autistic adults. Autism is a lifelong developmental disability, and most autistic adults need regular support in one form or another for the rest of their lives. And that’s okay.

From research on individuals with intellectual disability, we know that even among those who need significant day-to-day support, a high quality of life and positive outcomes, such as life satisfaction, happiness and successful employment, are still possible9,10. There is no reason to think autistic people are any different.
​
It is nice to see "life satisfaction" and "happiness" treated as their own measures of success, too.
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Visualize me nodding vigorously! Amen to your point.
I have a high-IQ, read Serious books, am "intellectual" and am also a complete failure, an utter outcast.
Success for folks like us does depend on the kind of autism one has (things worked out rather well for Bill Gates!), but for most of us it's a curse.
And that's because we're a social species. You don't fit in socially, it doesn't matter how smart you are, you'll probably be rejected.
 
Well if this isn't a "no @#$! Sherlock" moment. This is a planet of evolved apes, nothing has changed much over all these years. Survival of the fittest, and evolution is kicking its legs back on a table and taking its sweet time. Not saying that the future may be any better or worse, I don't have the answer to that or even a guess, but I know we've come a long way from our less-civilized, primitive roots.

The better you are at doing ape stuff, the higher up the ladder you'll go. That sadly means a lot with ASD will struggle at finding their place in the world, but that doesn't mean they can't have "success".
 
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WildCat said:
The better you are at doing ape stuff, the higher up the ladder you'll go. That sadly means a lot with ASD will struggle at finding their place in the world, but that doesn't mean they can't have "success".
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Funny you just got done posting this because I was watching "Planet of the apes." at this time.

But you do have a point there. Only the heartless, ruthless and evil ones are the one that make it to the top. That's why the psychopaths and sociopaths are the CEO's of corporations. Ever heard of Ted Bundy? If he hadn't been caught commiting all those murders. I'd bet he'd be governor of Washington state.
 
I think it depends on what mountain/ladder you're climbing, whether or not only the heartless and ruthless make it to the top.
 
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