Credits: Social Media
10 quick questions can highlight if you have traits of autism, says doctor
Statistically speaking, its highly likely that everyone knows someone with autism. The CDC estimates that 1 in 36 children in the US is autistic, with the numbers quite heavily weighted towards boys and away from girls.
Recent increases in the number of people with autism reflect improvements in outreach, screening, and de-stigmatization of autism diagnosis, according to Autism Speaks, one of the leading autism awareness charities in the US. Meanwhile, autism scholarship has come a long way. Scientists recently identified two distinct genetic bases for autism, and a new study warns that babies with disrupted sleep are more likely to grow into autistic adults than those who sleep well during infancy.
TikTok doctor shares the You Might Be On The Spectrum test for autism
Social medias Dr Sermed Mezher recently shared the Autism Spectrum Quotient-10 test, also called the AQ-10, with his 280K followers.
In his video, he says it helped doctors to figure out if you could have autism or not, and reels off the 10 questions included in the test. He doesnt explain much about the test itself, but he does note that scores of 6 or less indicate that youre unlikely to be autistic.
Embrace Autism (EA) explains that the AQ-10 is designed for people aged 16 and over with suspected autism but who do not have a learning disability.
It is available in numerous languages and consists of 10 simple statements. For each statement, you click Agree or Disagree according to EA, it makes no difference to your score whether you choose slightly or definitely, so you can just treat the statements as a binary choice between agree and disagree.
Quick, easily understood, and easy to score
The AQ-10 has its drawbacks, but as one clinician quoted by EA explains, its quick to take, easily understood, and the scoring is uncomplicated.
80% of people diagnosed with Aspergers syndrome reportedly score 6 or higher a reasonably high percentage. However, given its simplicity and brevity, the AQ-10 doesnt offer a lot of insight.
EA quotes another clinician as saying it allows them to do a quick two-minute screen to see if I should investigate further for autism spectrum condition.
However, they find it frustrating that the test offers 4 possible answers for each question, but that it then lumps them together into essentially two possible answers: I feel that it wastes my time debating between slightly and definitely.
Overall, EAs Dr Engelbrecht gives the AQ-10 a 2 out of 5 score for Clarity and lack of ambiguity but scores it highly for Appropriate and respectful wording and Testing accuracy.
If you take the AQ-10 and score 6 or higher, the next step is to take the full, 50-question Autism Spectrum Quotient test, a simple screening test that is used as a basis for pursuing a formal autism evaluation. Read more about it here.
If, on the other hand, you scored lower than 6 but still suspect you may be autistic, EA suggests taking the CAT-Q, as it identifies autistics that may be overlooked on other tests.
