Autism and Asperger’s Syndrome are two types of social disorders that are often considered one and the same. They indeed share some common symptoms and characteristics but at the same time they show some differences too between them.
It can be said that Asperger’s syndrome is a mild form of autism. This only shows that autism is greater in its impact than Asperger’s syndrome. One of the main differences between autism and Asperger’s syndrome is that people that suffer from autism show communication delays. On the other hand people that suffer from Asperger’s syndrome do not show communication delays.
In fact it can be said that people that suffer from Asperger’s syndrome show good levels of intelligence and they seem to perform well in terms of social behavior. On the other hand the people that suffer from the bout of autism do not tend to show good levels of intelligence and they seem to fail miserably when it comes to social behavior.
Studies show that patients that are diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome respond well to treatment. They attend regularly to their college and get degrees and can lead an independent life as well. This is the reason why Asperger’s syndrome is sometimes called ‘high-functioning autism’ or simply as HFA.
Asperger’s syndrome shows symptoms such as poor social skills, formal language and pervasive interest in a given subject to mention a few. It is no hyperbole to say that the characteristics and the behavior of a genius and a person affected by Asperger’s syndrome look alike. It is also true that traits of Asperger’s syndrome were shown by many geniuses in the past.
You are right if you say that both autism and Asperger’s syndrome fall under the category of diseases called Autistic Spectrum Disorders otherwise called ASD. The higher group of disorders includes disorders such as childhood disintegrative disorder, pervasive developmental disorder and Rett’s disorder.
People with autism are characterized by scattered cognitive profile with better overall abilities in the performance range of tasks. Involvement in the social world is more in the case of the people diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome than the people diagnosed with autism. This is also one of the main differences between the two. People that suffer with autism should be specifically taught about social skills. They would then understand them. On the other hand social skills come naturally to the people that suffer from Asperger’s syndrome.