Violence linked to Aspergers?

The majority of us aspire are peaceful people who would never attempt or condone any kind of violence except in 1 maybe 2 exceptions these are 1. To defend ourselves and 2. In protecting others who are under attack. 

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it doesn't look like much of a story to me. It is only looking (AIUI) at people hospitalised because of their autism and it did not find a heightened risk. It just suggests that hospitalised patients with autism may be violent. It doesn't really pass a "so what?" test. Autistic people are perhaps not as different to other people. I'm not sure what they expected to find.

It strikes me that there are autistic people who have been brutalised because they have not been able to make themselves understood. Such people may naturally be violent.

Other autistic people do not have the theory of mind to understand what it means to hurt other people. These people may hurt other people because they don't realise what it really feels like to the vistim.

As far as I can tell there are many autistic people who are less violent than many non-autistic people. This doesn't really say much though - I don't think that you can say much more than autistic people can be violent but so can anyone else.

this story isn't related but I can't post a new topic for some reason but it's relevant

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/stephen-hawking-artificial-intelligence-diaster-human-history-leverhulme-centre-cambridge-a7371106.html

Gone a bit off topic of autism and violence.

To statistics and computing.

Most vacancies I am looking at now, want incredible breadth and depth of knowledge. That I just don't have.

My computer language experience goes back to old Fortran, then Pascal, a bit of C, C++, BBC basic, quick basic, visual basic.  I am now starting on Java and JavaScript.

Statistical packages I've used, statpk, SPSS, minitab.  Now R is the preferred academic language/package.

But my real problem is autism and getting along with people.

Hi Robert123, I suppose it depends on which area of data analysis you work in, or rather which areas you consider to be 'Real Statistics'.

My original degree is in Computer Science, but I got lured into London's sordid world of 'Direct Marketing' by an offer of much more money. Previously I had been doing 'Systems Programming' which wasnt that well paid. Since quite a lot of raw client marketing data is almost unusable due to poor standards, I was hired by an agency to evaluate data quality & then write bespoke software to clean & enhance it for the statisticians as their time can be quite expensive.

I had done some statistics in my degree, but over the years I picked up quite a lot from working along side the full time statisticians, especially being able to tell when data was too biased or incomplete to work with. I also developed software to perform some automated statistical analysis based on formulae specified by my colleagues.

I wouldn't exactly recommend 'Direct Marketing' (or 'Junk Mail' to be honest) as a great career choice, but it can be very lucrative for qualified statisticians who don't mind lowering their career standards a bit. I'm back up North & out of touch with it now, but still know some statisticians who have done very well for themselves purely within that industry.

Not such a great choice for programmers though & in retrospect my career would have been much more stable had I not followed the money, but such is life!

Have fun

Pirate Santa said:

I was always an easy target for bullies when I was at school precisely because I found the whole idea of physical violence barbaric & abhorrent. Sadly this was in the 1970s, when parents & teachers were unaware of the long term mental health issues that bullying causes.

Having been involved in Statistics & Data Analysis for most of my working life though, I am very sceptical of controversial studies based on small or unrepresentive datasets. The linked study is only of 422 individuals which is far too small for reliable analysis. It also states that all the people in the study were 'hospitalised' which immediately indicates that it is unrepresentive, since most people on the ASD spectrum don't require hospitalisation.

In my opinion, I simply don't see how the linked study can attempt to make any assertions about the general ASD/Aspergers community when it seems to be solely based on such a small unrepresentative dataset.

In other words, I think it's probably even less reliable than newspaper election opinion polls.

Most of your working life in 'statistics and data analysis', sounds like ideal work for me.  My first degree was in statistics, but most of my working life was in software development and maintenance and user support.

All the statistics vacancies want ridiculously high experience of packages and methodologies.

I was always an easy target for bullies when I was at school precisely because I found the whole idea of physical violence barbaric & abhorrent. Sadly this was in the 1970s, when parents & teachers were unaware of the long term mental health issues that bullying causes.

Having been involved in Statistics & Data Analysis for most of my working life though, I am very sceptical of controversial studies based on small or unrepresentive datasets. The linked study is only of 422 individuals which is far too small for reliable analysis. It also states that all the people in the study were 'hospitalised' which immediately indicates that it is unrepresentive, since most people on the ASD spectrum don't require hospitalisation.

In my opinion, I simply don't see how the linked study can attempt to make any assertions about the general ASD/Aspergers community when it seems to be solely based on such a small unrepresentative dataset.

In other words, I think it's probably even less reliable than newspaper election opinion polls.

Data set is old (1988-2000) and the little bit I read suggested someone was doing secondary data analysis for a Master's degree in psychology.

Co-pathogy with addiction is a big issue in undiagnosed ADHD, I'm less certain on the data with ASD, but given the freaky side effects and reactions to medications some people with neurodiverse brains produce, I'm not surprised that there are a few violent ASD people.

Thing is, we already know the prison population is full of undiagnosed ADHD folk (estimates of 25% in youth prison population) and having done some work with youth services, there is a fair number of fetal alcohol syndrome sufferers, many who have similar issues to severe ASD, in that population so did they screen for FAS?

hello.

firstly, that is an abstract, not a story. it is an abstract, and therefore the full context of the piece is not evident. 

secondly, the date of that abstract is 2008. i would suggest it is wise to bear this in mind, as often academic research or opinion based on research is relative; particularly in this case as medical studies appear to be the focus...

moving on to violence: the definition of violence is a broad one. it could be suggested that a person firing a gun is perpetrating an act of violence. however, context alters the reasoning. if a peron is firing a gun in self defence? if self defense, then by who's definition. violence is relative. 

a tiger killing its prey - killing is violent, but also natural.... 

as for myself, i have been forced to defend myself physically, mentally, emotionally, and have perpetrated what could be construed as acts of viloence towards others, because i have been forced to defend myself; and also i have perpetrated acts of violence against myself in terms of self abuse etc. self harm, psychological and emotional trauma etc.

the thing about violence is that it is relative. even crash dieting, could carry with it violent undertones, particularly if stress on the body is perpetrated.... forcing to starve yourself for the purpose of 'looking good' is quiet violent when one thinks about it...

i would suggest therefore that violence is a spectrum. 

as an autistic person, i abhor violence. but i will defend myself if necessary. i don't want to be violent. but i witness violence every day, against the planet, its animals, and i see people interact with others etc. etc. in violent ways, often very low key but equally as damaging, sometimes even acclimated violence appears 'normal' or is accepted as 'normalised' behaviour...

this has been said before on this site but, autistc people are peaceful creatures. i don't see, and have not seen any evidence yet towards supporting the premise that autistics are predisposed to violence. 

MrAsperger said:

What are people's views on violence being linked to Aspergers?
I found this story on the provided link:-

http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0886260508322195

Hi MrAsperger, and welcome!

I can't speak for anyone else... but to be honest, I've had more than enough violence and abuse meted out against me over my lifetime for me ever to wish to mete it out against anyone else, or see it meted out against anyone else in my behalf. I abhor it in all forms.  If anything, my life has made me much more ready to identify and empathise with the vulnerable, the bullied and the oppressed.

I once said to a therapist I was seeing (the one who finally identified what she suspected was ASC, which eventually led to my diagnosis) that, given the abuse I've suffered, my life could easily have turned me into a vengeful psychopath.  But nothing could be further from the truth.  I have learned that bullies, generally, are insecure people themselves.  I am unfortunate enough to have a narcissist in my family, who has made things very difficult for me and for other family members over the years.  My response, finally - now - is to walk away.  I accept that people like that are toxic to me.  I could do this person untold damage if I so wished.  But I understand that they are themselves damaged - they simply don't realise it.  And probably never will.

I'm not sure if this answers your query - but maybe it gives some insight from one particular personal perspective.

Best regards,

Tom