Autistic Checklist

This is a checklist of common experiences of Autistic people. I made it as a tool to help with self-diagnosis. Nobody has all of these traits, and allistic (non-Autistic) people may have a few of them. If many of these are familiar, you might be Autistic.

Hypersensitivity (e.g. to bright lights, loud sounds, particular sounds, rough clothing, wrinkled sheets, strong smells, or sharp tastes). For some, the inability to escape from unpleasant or overstimulating experiences can render them unable to communicate or even think clearly, and might possibly cause unresponsiveness (a "shutdown") or a loss of self-control (a "meltdown").
Inability to filter out sensory input. (e.g., background noise, or two people talking at once, can make it more than usually difficult to understand speech. You may notice small sounds that others do not.)
Stimming (doing particular physical things or seeking particular sensory input) is helpful for self-soothing, and for proactively self-regulating one's nervous system. Similarly, a need for proprioceptive (body position) input may cause sitting in unusual positions.
An emphasis on learning or creating rules to follow, especially for how to interact with others. Breaking rules is hard.
Integrity. Autistic people will tend to follow their rules regardless of who is watching, and without any expected rewards, simply because it is the right thing to do.
Difficulty intuiting social rules and norms. (You may figure them out, but they don't just come to you without conscious thought.) Others may find you impolite when you didn't mean to be.
Difficulty discerning how other people feel, and what other people think, without being told explicitly. (Newer evidence indicates that allistics have the same difficulty, but just don't notice or care.)
Contrary to the above, some Autistic people can read others extremely well, and might experience difficulties, including shutting down, in response to the intensity of the experience or perceived threats. They may engage very well with animals, small children, and safe people.
A tendency to take statements more literally than intended. Ask trusted friends whether you do this, because you won't necessarily know. (Incidentally, this quality makes it easier for abusers to lie to Autistic people about how they meant things.)
Autism often coexists with prosopagnosia (face blindness), ADHD, and/or alexithymia (inability to identify and describe one's own emotions).
Autism often shares symptoms with (or perhaps symptoms caused by) stress/trauma: Executive function difficulty (see below), rejection sensitive dysphoria, anxiety, and irritable bowel syndrome.
Disability. Basically, if you have trouble thinking, or difficulty acting on your decisions, count yourself as disabled. These are common ways this can manifest:
- Autistic inertia. This is difficulty starting, stopping, or changing tasks. This could involve fear, anxiety, difficulty following instructions, or a feeling of disconnect between your brain's intentions and your body's movements. Transitions between places and tasks may take extra time and mental preparation.
- Difficulty with executive function (deliberate control of one's own actions): Skills involved with planning, working memory, attention, and self-control.
- Trouble remembering to do something later. (Poor prospective memory.)
- Motor coordination difficulties.
Special interest. An Autistic person may passionately delve into an interest, becoming unusually knowledgeable on the subject.
Acceptance. Autistic people tend to accept other people as they are, without judgment. They often do not see being weird, unusual, or nonconforming as a negative trait.
Repetition. Autistic people may do the same action or activity over and over.
Persistence. Autistic people often stick to a task or a problem for however long it takes to finish, long after an allistic person would have given up.
Masking. Autistic people often make an effort to pretend to be "normal," in order to fit in with neurotypicals. This can feel like hiding who they really are. The attempt might subject them to physical or emotional discomfort. Degrees of success vary, but those making a great deal of effort (successful or not) can suffer burnout as a result. If masking becomes habitual and automatic, a person may not know how to stop, and may not know who they are without their mask.
Introversion. Autistic people tend to prefer alone time or one-on-one time to larger social gatherings. Although gathering with friends may be enjoyable and indispensible, being alone helps them recover and recharge.
Creativity. Autistic ability to make mental connections yields creative art and outside-the-box solutions.
Getting along well with other Autistic people. Autistic people can have similar expectations of social behavior, which helps them accommodate each other and communicate better. Also, Autistic people put in a great deal of work to understand and get along with others. Allistic people typically do not reciprocate this. Thus, Autistic people often communicate and get along better with other Autistic people than they do with allistic people, even when the differences between their communication and socialization styles are as large as their differences with allistic people.
Honesty. Autistic people typically do not lie casually or well, although they may learn to lie when honesty incurs punishment.
Synesthesia: Experiencing a sensory input as if through a different sense. (e.g., written characters may appear to have different colors, or sounds may have taste.)
Many Autistic people enjoy making lists.
Autistic people may not show their emotions in ways that are clearly recognizeable to allistic people. This has led to the old-fashioned myth of Autistic people being emotionless. It also leads to others not taking them seriously when they express their needs, or say that they are stressed, overwhelmed, at a breaking point, and/or can't take it any more.
Autistic people often feel great empathy for other people, and for animals. They exhibit great kindness as a result.
Autistic people tend to experience the world more intensely than allistic people do. This includes emotional pain (e.g., from empathy, humiliation, or punishment). This can make them particularly fearful of doing wrong, and of displeasing people.
Autistic people struggle to feel safe among neurotypicals. They may have developmental trauma or PTSD from this.
Friends: Friendlessness is not a norm for Autistic people. (That is a common myth.) Autistic people fit in well with quirky friend groups, provided that they can find them. If they cannot (or if they are not among those friends), they may be bullied.
Loyalty. Many Autistic people highly value their friendships, and will try to preserve them whenever possible. (This may be exploited by abusers who ought to be left behind.)
Autistic people often notice details that others don't.
Autistic people may give too much information, or share others' information inappropriately, not realizing that it was confidential. (This relates to "difficulty intuiting social rules and norms".)
Autistic people may be too generous, have difficulty setting and maintaining boundaries, and have a hard time saying "no".
Autistic people may have a hard time understanding that other people don't think or act the way that they do, and so may expect others to be open, honest, and generous. It will be hurtful and confusing when this turns out not to be the case, even with people who have not yet earned a trusted friendship.
Some Autistic people are non-speaking, always or intermittently. They communicate in other ways.
Autistic people may have difficulty finding ways to keep a conversation going, or making small talk at all.
Some Autistic people feel as though they are literally aliens, and are not living on the correct planet. This is so common that Asperger's (an outdated term for a part of the autism spectrum) is sometimes called "wrong planet syndrome".
Autistic people may be disturbed by things not going the way they expect, or by changes in routine.
Autistic people typically do not learn to use sarcasm as easily as allistic people do. However, like most skills, they may practice it until they are proficient, even if they lack native talent.
Autistic people often do not respect power hierarchies. They will expect powerful people to be just as accountable as anyone else.
Autistic people are often willing to say what needs to be said, while others try to ignore the "elephant in the room". (This comes from a combination of honesty, justice, failure to "read the room" and intuit social norms, and disrespect of power hierarchies, especially as most taboos exist only in service of the powerful.)
Autistic people may be uncomfortable with things that do not make sense, and have difficulty just "rolling with it". They are likely to question inconsistency and hypocrisy.
Autistic people often need everything to be correct. They may be quick to point out exceptions to broad statements.
Autistic people often have a strong sense of justice. Injustice bothers them in a way that they cannot let go.
Autistic people are more likely to be gender diverse (trans, nonbinary, agender, or otherwise gender-queer) than allistic people are.
Autistic people tend to fear being misunderstood. They may go to great lengths to explain, clarify, or rephrase their thoughts.
Autistic people are often good at recognizing patterns: In numbers, in language, in shapes, in behaviors, and in other experiences.
Autistic people may react atypically to anesthesia. Some anesthetics might not work at all, or might require a larger dose. (Note that this is also true for redheads and folks with Ehlers-Danlos syndrome.) Some Autistic people have trouble coming out of general anesthesia, or may wake up early.

Notes

The usual method of self-diagnosis seems to go like this: Share society's misconceptions about autism. Don't identify with those at all. Have Autistic friends. Learn from them. Start learning from the wider Autistic community. Find their experiences familiar. Learn more, and identify with much of what you learn. Start wondering if maybe you are Autistic. Endure your Autistic friends being smug about already knowing. Have a therapist tell you that you're not Autistic. Learn that the Autistic community understands Autism way better than therapists do. Think about all you know about actual Autistic traits and experiences, and self-diagnose. Maybe present a convincing case to a therapist, to get an official diagnosis, or give up on getting one.^*

While the merits of that method must be many for it to be so common, not everybody has the needed exposure to the Autistic community, nor the time and mental energy to process a wealth of often personal and anecdotal information to build into a comprehensive understanding of autism. Some people, including friends of mine, needed a shortcut: A list like this one, that has already been winnowed from an otherwise daunting abundance of information. I couldn't find one at the time, so I made it for them, even knowing that it was an act of utter hubris to do so. I offer it here to whoever else might need it.

This list is different from the criteria that a therapist might use in an evaluation. Therapists' understanding of autism is taught from the perspective of neurotypicals/allistics. It focuses on outward, visible behavior (and "behaviors"); on how a person's autism affects the comfort of the people around them; and on trauma, burnout, and meltdowns, all of which are really secondary effects caused by the strain placed on Autistic people by their society and surroundings.

^* A contributor writes:

The other hugely common way this goes is, "Have child, child struggles in school, teacher suggests psychological assessment, structured clinical interview leads parent to realize things they always thought were normal about themselves now fall under this diagnostic umbrella."

The Basics

For those new to listening to the Autistic community:

Autism is a different way of being and thinking. Although it is often defined as a disability, disability is caused by a lack of accommodations. Everybody requires accommodations. Some Autistic people can get by on the accommodations routinely provided to allistic people, and so are not disabled. Others are disabled by a lack of relief from the environment and expectations they are subject to. There is no such thing as a "high-functioning" or "low-functioning" Autistic person. Use the terms "high-masking" and "low-masking" instead. "Functioning" labels are used by fake authorities (usually parents and therapists) to dismiss all Autistic self-advocacy: They claim that "high-functioning" people are not autistic enough to speak on behalf of the Autistic population, and that "low-functioning" people aren't competent enough to take seriously. In fact, the only experts on autism are Autistic themselves.

ABA (Applied Behavior Analysis) is autistic conversion therapy, a pseudoscience based on its predecessor, gay conversion therapy. Both systems punish and torture people into denying their needs and pretending to be who they are not. Both systems cause trauma, PTSD, and suicide.

The Autistic community in general prefers the term "Autistic person" to "person with autism". It is an identity, not a disease. Individuals vary, however, and ought to be addressed as they prefer. (As of this writing, I am capitalizing in accordance with these guidelines.)

Autism Speaks and Autism Society are evil. ASAN (Autistic Self Advocacy Network) and AWN (Autistic Women & Nonbinary Network) are good. Go gold, not blue. The puzzle piece is a problematic symbol. The infinity sign (gold or rainbow) is accepted.

Professional diagnosis can be hard to obtain, and depending on your needs, it might or might not be useful. An Autistic person who does not fit the outdated stereotype of the white cis male child with meltdowns will not match many therapists' vision of autism. Someone who has developed compensatory strategies may present atypically. That said, there exist good therapists, some of whom can help with the self-understanding and self-advocacy that may be necessary. A checklist of your own Autistic experiences can also be useful.

This document would not have been possible if I hadn't learned so much through the advocacy efforts of Caitlin West. Thank you, Caitlin.

Autistic Checklist

Further Reading

Notes

The Basics