Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment High Fluid Intelligence and Autism

I posted earlier that our daughter's fluid reasoning subtest score was 160. In fact, the tester ran out of questions and was not able to ask any more questions on that subtest.

I checked around and found that there is a link between aspergers and fluid reasoning. Here is one article on the subject: "Superior fluid intelligence in children with Asperger�s disorder"

http://www.freewebs.com/adiscussion/Superior%20fluid%20intelligence%20in%20children%20with%20Asperger's%20disorder.pdf

We have an appointment for our daughter to see a neurologist and a neuropyschologist for an assessment regarding whether she is on the autism spectrum. Her speech therapist believes that she is on the spectrum, but made it clear that she cannot diagnose this.

High fluid reasoning, even if prevalent amongst people with aspergers, isn't part of the diagnostic criteria.

What is it that makes the speech therapist think that she is on the spectrum? Are you having difficulties at home aside from speech?

Here are the diagnostic criteria for autism and aspergers, at least in the DSM-IV (I don't know when the DSM-V is scheduled to come out but I recall there may be controversial changes to this section?): http://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/autism/hcp-dsm.html I don't know a whole lot about Asperger's, so I'm sure someone else will chime in, but according to the diagnostic criteria, a speech delay is contrary to the diagnosis. My understanding of autism, aspergers and the spectrum is that they are predicated on significant social impairment. A very, very bright child with a speech delay and sensory processing issues is not necessarily autistic or having aspergers. I like the Eide's book The Mislabeled Child, which explains the differences between many such issues, and as far as autism goes, they focus on a severe lack of emotional empathy.

FWIW, I think the DSM is poorly drafted in that it's confusing, and I also think that our understanding of these issues still has a long, long way to go.

Unless your daughter is experiencing significant problems unrelated to speech itself, I would not be one to go looking for a diagnosis.

We are having some other issues. Thank you for reminding me that those other issues may have other causes.

Fluid Reasoning is a human trait, not an Autistic trait.

The relationship between Aspergers and FR does not necessarily go both ways. In other words, an Aspie may have a tendency to have high FR, but a kid with high FR does not necessarily have Asperger's.

As far as studies of Aspies, go. Parents with higher intelligence tend to get more services for their kids thus their kids get identified at a greater rate. There is a good argument that there is selection bias in many studies involving these kids.

I have been thinking about everything you both have said about this. Our daughter has been evaluated by three OTs who all said that she is not on the spectrum. Her pediatrician and a developmental pediatrician also said she is not on the spectrum.

She does have clumsiness and expressive delays in her speech, as though she is hesitating to get her words out, but not stuttering.

What if she just has SPD and giftedness? I also talked with a clinical psychologist who evaluates gifted children who told me that eye tracking issues are a common concern. The psychologist also said that vision training is helpful for this. The psychologist said that average processing scores usually go with high fluid reasoning in six year olds, because six year old hands are still six year old hands.

Our daughter does have eye tracking issues, and she is very emotional and affectionate, tells jokes, engages in witty banter, has a huge imagination. She has friends but does best one on one and has more of a challenge in groups.

I went through the diagnostic criteria and imho she only meets two of those criteria, 2a and 2b regarding speech. The first speech therapist who evaluated her when she was four ran through all the questions up to the seven year old level, then stopped because she didn't have the next level of tests with her and our time was up, so she never met a ceiling. That ST said our daughter's apparent expressive delays were actually caused by our daughter trying to express her thoughts with a four year old mouth and that ST was not needed. She can talk and have back and forth, but other people usually interrupt her before she can get her words out.

I just wanted to report back that we received a preliminary report from our daughter's neuropsychologist that she is not on the spectrum. The neuropsychologist is giving an additional IQ test, WISC-iv Differential Abilities Index, since our daughter's short term memory and processing speed scores were average or high average, which affected her overall IQ score.