Published on 12, July, 2020
I prefer to use autism or ASD because I believe high and low-functioning autism creates a false perception of The Autism Spectrum. To me and I imagine many others, low-functioning and high-functioning create the image of a horizontal line with one side saying "most autistic" and the other side saying "least autistic", especially since I hear people say "end of the spectrum."
I see The Autism Spectrum as more of a circle divided with each section representing a difficulty, with the individual in the centre having a variation of difficulties with differing levels of severity to one another. Like someone described as low-functioning may be able to walk through shops with no oversensitivity while someone described as high-functioning can have a higher level of severity in sensory processing that it's too hard and not be able to.
Do you think we should avoid the use of high and low-functioning as they're not clinical terms anyway?
I think that there is, in general and in clinical thought, a lot of confusion between what impairments are caused directly by autism, what are caused by the interaction between autistic people and neurotypical society, and what are caused by comorbidities. For example, are the difficulties that some autistics, that might be considered 'low functioning', face caused by 'more severe autism', or by comorbid intellectual and cognitive impairments? It isn't a question that I have found to be addressed in any meaningful way.