Asperger / ASD and Romantic Relationships Research Project

[Simberg]

Hello,

 

I am a Trainee Clinical Psychologist in London and am carrying out research, as part of my doctorate, on romantic relationships in which one of the partners has a diagnosis of an Autism Spectrum Disorder (including Asperger’s Syndrome). I am making this post to ask whether any members of this forum would be interested in taking part in the project, or would like to pass on details of the project to other individuals who might be interested.

 

The research concerns ways in which people with ASD and their partners experience closeness in their relationships. For the research, I aim to interview both people with the diagnosis and 'neuro-typical' individuals in a relationship with someone with ASD about their experiences, although I am planning at this stage to only interview one person from any couple.

 

At present, very little research has been carried out regarding romantic relationships in which one or both partners is affected by ASD. I therefore hope, through the project, to develop a greater understanding for professional and research communities of the values, experiences, and needs of people with ASD and their partners.

 

I am able to provide anyone interested in the project with information sheets giving further details of the research. If anyone is interested in participating, or is curious about knowing more about the research, they can contact me by e-mail at u0933897@uel.ac.uk, and I will be happy to send through the information sheets, or to answer any queries. I am also always grateful for any comments or suggestions that others are able to provide regarding the project or its topic.

 

Yours sincerely,

 

Joe Schwaerzler

Trainee Clinical Psychologist

University of East London

[darkshine]

The research concerns ways in which people with ASD and their partners experience closeness in their relationships. For the research, I aim to interview both people with the diagnosis and 'neuro-typical' individuals in a relationship with someone with ASD about their experiences, although I am planning at this stage to only interview one person from any couple.

 

Hello, this sounds quite interesting but how can you tell about it properly unless you interview both members of each couple because the experience of one - although valid - is only giving part of the picture - surely to see what the experience of closeness is would require the other party to give their impression also and enable a comparison of these experiences (which may or may not show up some interesting differences in perception on both sides).

 

Also, I appreciate research has limitations and this could be suggested for further research - but as I see it, to get a comprehensive answer of any actual differences you'd need to have ASD only couples, NT only couples, and ASD/NT mixed couples... (although I appreciate you could probably bypass the NT only ones as there is probably already research on closeness for that) but there may be difference between the other 2 samples I said (ASD/ASD and NT/ASD couples.)

 

(and that's without going into anything to do with gender, age, sexuality, degree of diagnosis and the effects that has, individual differences etc etc)

 

I'm possibly being annoying though to feel free to disregard my opinion

 

Darkshine

Edited August 8, 2011 by darkshine

[Simberg]

Hi Darkshine – thanks for replying to the post! You’ve raised some valid points.

 

The decision to only interview one partner from any given couple was reached after some consideration with my supervisor, and stems both from the research question and practical considerations.

 

In terms of the research question, the focus is on looking at common themes in the experiences of people with ASD in romantic relationships, and common themes in the experiences of NT individuals in relationships with ASD partners. Rather than to build a model of how such relationships ‘work’, my aim is to build an understanding of ‘what it is like’ for people with ASD to be in relationships with an NT partner, and ‘what it is like’ to have a partner with ASD. As such, only individual partners’ accounts are needed, as a participant’s partner could not necessarily tell us more about the participant’s own experiences. In terms of interesting similarities and differences in the experiences of people with ASD and NT partners, I will be comparing the themes emerging from ASD and NT participants’ experiences as whole groups, which should provide an indication of the sorts of similarities and differences that are likely to affect partners in individual relationships.

 

That being said, it would, as you suggest, add another dimension to explore how individuals’ experiences compare directly with their partners’. However, in order to incorporate this into the study, it would be necessary to require that in each case both partners were interviewed, which, from other researchers’ experiences, can make it very difficult to find enough participants!

 

It would also be interesting, as you say, to gather information from both NT/NT and ASD/ASD relationships, to look for significant similarities and differences between these different groups. The reason why I have not opted to follow this route (aside from the practical limitations on my project!) is that I am specifically interested in how, if at all, people with ASD and NT partners might feel that relating to other people in a different way from their partners affects their relationships. A research aim to focus on experiences does not require comparison groups, as I’m not seeking to say anything about how the experiences in ‘mixed couples’ might differ from those in other types of relationships.

 

I hope this makes the reasons for the approach I've used a bit clearer. If you have any further thoughts, however, please do reply, or contact me by e-mail!

 

Best wishes,

 

Joe

[darkshine]

Hi Joe, sorry my reply took so long (I didn't notice you'd replied til just now - dunno if that's due to an oversight by me or my notifications - probably me...)

 

Thank you for responding to my points - I think I must have lost the plot - it's all them years of quantitative study I guess I've just finished a phenomenological report on the experience of wearing a uniform, so should have noticed the similarities especially since I spent over a week doing the part on common themes

 

Honestly I think I've melted my brain or something, still, at least I've given you a chance to justify it and maybe it'll be of use for your reflexive/further research bit - if you have to do that too?

 

It definitely sounds interesting though - and it makes me wonder whether there will be a great variation on these experiences or whether there will be more similarities... So have you started yet then?

 

Sorry again for delay

 

Darkshine

[Simberg]

Hi Darkshine,

 

No worries about taking a while to reply - I'm just glad my response makes sense, and, yes, it's always helpful to practice putting into words ideas that sometimes might seem quite abstract.

 

The project is still in the recruitment phase, which could last for a few months yet. However, other necessary preparations - e.g. reviewing related research and planning the analysis - is very much in progress. I am still looking for participants though, for anyone reading this post!

 

It's interesting to come across someone else engaged in phenomenological research - can I ask in what context you're working?

 

Best wishes,

 

Joe

[philipo]

I think you'll most probably fined (writing from a blokes perscpective) that auty men are loyal,don't play away,are devoted to their kids and more interested in the 'emotional' side of things than being a patriarchal type.They relate better with kids and take a bigger part in the housework/domestic side of things.you;ll also find they are less worried about biological parentage and prefer women who are a bit matriarchal.

they have periods when they don't want to be touched ,which obviously interferes with the relationship and can have problems with clothes changing/bathing/teeth brushing.they will be far less inclined to drink and have problems with 'audio/visual chit chat' like soaps on tele and x factor ,big brother etc.We can onlyu speak for our selves and theres not a CLEAR range of behaviours ,so researching how asd affects relationships is a big hill for you!They don't do domestic violence or 'diss' their partners.

try looking at the neandrathal societies and the proximal power realtionships between men/women.

You must also make a distintion between subjects/couples where the dx has happend early and when its happend late,or in my case too late.Undiagnosed asd is destructive for many realtionships,only mitigated by the immense positives that are a boon to family/personal relationships.

In the case of early dx you will also come across problems where the asd partner is 'expected' to behave as an asd job,despite all the 'everyone is different' philosphy,due to learnt expectations of a disability.being dx'd at 48 I am philisophical about it but sometimes wonder that what would have happend if I'd been dx at a young age?Probably would have beleived all the ###### that realtionships are hard/impossible and that i would have been expected to be great at maths but have no empathy with partner and unable to see things from their point of veiw.

Think theirs loads of myths and we must remmember that there's a nearly unique 'mix' of 'impairment/disfunction'.

Think generally that asd'rs are mostly better at sensitivity and sex.cheers

[Mumble]

We can onlyu speak for our selves

No - you can only speak for yourself.

[philipo]

thats why I dont bother much with this site,the few billy no mates who have nothing else going on in their lives,have any forum users ever had kids or a long term relationship?I'm sure they have,or should we refer to the book of Autisim and behave according to the low expectations,I've noticed my spelling incites quite a reaction.

Anything constructive to add to relationships and autisim would be helpfull,or perhaps mere blokes are not allowed a comment?Who knows but I do know I'm glad I'm me.

are you sure you've got asd Mumbles? i would reccommend some people get out the house a bit more.

 

unfortunatley i mark mail from this site as 'spam',even though there's a lot of people I do talk to privatly from this site.Wish I had a secondary education then I'd have learnt to write 'in the third person' or summat,I'm not botherd really and think that tackling the real day to day issues of asd/auty awareness will only happen when undiagnosed autie/asd'rs start going postal in shopping malls,as the subject/disability seems dominated by radio 4 land ,economically priveledged bigots and self interested 'specialists' and drug pushing 'mental health' 'proffesionals',

keep taking the medication.....goodbye forever......class is more important than asd,sex,gender.

Edited August 30, 2011 by philipo

[matzoball]

thats why I dont bother much with this site,the few billy no mates who have nothing else going on in their lives,have any forum users ever had kids or a long term relationship?I'm sure they have,or should we refer to the book of Autisim and behave according to the low expectations,I've noticed my spelling incites quite a reaction.

Anything constructive to add to relationships and autisim would be helpfull,or perhaps mere blokes are not allowed a comment?Who knows but I do know I'm glad I'm me.

are you sure you've got asd Mumbles? i would reccommend some people get out the house a bit more.

 

unfortunatley i mark mail from this site as 'spam',even though there's a lot of people I do talk to privatly from this site.Wish I had a secondary education then I'd have learnt to write 'in the third person' or summat,I'm not botherd really and think that tackling the real day to day issues of asd/auty awareness will only happen when undiagnosed autie/asd'rs start going postal in shopping malls,as the subject/disability seems dominated by radio 4 land ,economically priveledged bigots and self interested 'specialists' and drug pushing 'mental health' 'proffesionals',

keep taking the medication.....goodbye forever......class is more important than asd,sex,gender.

 

You seem to bother with it quite a fair bit Philipo, especially when trying to troll threads.

 

You can't speak for everyone, and I find your attitude quite offensive. No doubt people may disagree with my viewpoint - but at this point in my life they are welcome to their opinion because I can't demand mine without allowing others theirs.

 

I am the person on the spectrum in my relationship and it's actually me who is the affectionate one, and my partner the distant one - he is NT.

 

Your take on spectrum people is quite disheartening and actually underlines a lot of myths that people who don't know a lot about ASD tend to subscribe to. No one person is the same as the other - there are certainly commonalities, but to lump certain traits and behaviours in with having AS is ill advised.

 

Some men are idiots regardless of being spectrum or not, so are some women. Having experienced a fair few revelations in the past few weeks I have come to the conclusion(and this is not just about asd) that just because you have a disability does not automatically make you a saint or sinner.

 

A person can't just stick certain behaviours behind a diagnosis or condition and be automatically be absolved of sins or praised for good deeds just because they have it.

 

You are not your disability - and it's shoddy behaviour at best to reason cruddy behaviour with - oh it's just my asd I can't help it - without at least challenging those behaviours and knowing for sure whether it is or isn't.

 

Having asd certainly influences behaviours, but it isn't the totality of why those behaviours are there.

[Autistic and proud]

Can't help as I am lucky enough to be married to another autistic person ( she is lovely) we get close when we want but we understand if we don't want. ( just got told no you don't You pester)

[RainbowsButterflies]

We strongly suspect that my husband has AS so can't help either.

 

Philipo - apart from the fact that I disagree with generalising/stereotyping in general, your observations are way off the mark in our situation. My DH doesn't have a lot to do with looking after the kids or the housework (he works long hours and is building us an extension - I'm not implying that he doesn't do his share), and he really struggles with emotions and the romantic side of a relationship. We are all different and our autism affects us in different ways!

[philipo]

Yeap ,thats write Rainbow Butterflies,its worth remembering that some forum members are 'new to writing/expressing themselves and can write from their personal experience,especially siince they were dumped in care for undiagnosed hfa asd,

if this site was a meeting room i could see a hard core of members slagging off contriburord whose litery skills are low standard,

We are all different and our autisim affects us in different ways.what flabberghasts me is the LOW expectations!!!!

This site won't be much use when many of its members firstly demand that contributers are able to spell and do written communication to degree level,Its called discriminbation,against 1,000's of asd sufferers.ones's who can't even type it out or verbalsie it,THE SILENT ones,

In the new year I would have dissapeared completly ,i loathe people who lord it over those with no education and economic social priveledge,some members on this site included,jettat tora mumbles,get out more!!!

 

thanks to the site members for putting up with me,just keep away from drugs designed for serious mental health conditions and resist attempts for you essence to be normalised.Bye forever and thanks for all the fish,

[matzoball]

Yeap ,thats write Rainbow Butterflies,its worth remembering that some forum members are 'new to writing/expressing themselves and can write from their personal experience,especially siince they were dumped in care for undiagnosed hfa asd,

if this site was a meeting room i could see a hard core of members slagging off contriburord whose litery skills are low standard,

We are all different and our autisim affects us in different ways.what flabberghasts me is the LOW expectations!!!!

This site won't be much use when many of its members firstly demand that contributers are able to spell and do written communication to degree level,Its called discriminbation,against 1,000's of asd sufferers.ones's who can't even type it out or verbalsie it,THE SILENT ones,

In the new year I would have dissapeared completly ,i loathe people who lord it over those with no education and economic social priveledge,some members on this site included,jettat tora mumbles,get out more!!!

 

thanks to the site members for putting up with me,just keep away from drugs designed for serious mental health conditions and resist attempts for you essence to be normalised.Bye forever and thanks for all the fish,

 

No one is bothering about your grammar. I think you just have a very big chip on your shoulder and you are projecting it onto others. No one is looking down on you - you are assuming they are because they aren't agreeing with you and are challenging your opinion.

 

Remember your perception of the situation may not necessarily reflect the reality of it. No one on here has to agree 100% of the time, but it doesn't mean it's a class war when their opinion differs.

 

Essentially what I am trying to say is please don't be rude to people when they don't agree with you.

[Mumble]

No one is bothering about your grammar. I think you just have a very big chip on your shoulder and you are projecting it onto others. No one is looking down on you - you are assuming they are because they aren't agreeing with you and are challenging your opinion.

Absolutely. Have to say I am now laughing at how someone can play the hurt tortured sole quite so badly...

 

My previous comment was nothing about grammar/spellng/education and you are soooo way off the mark in the assumptions you make of me.

 

Let me clarify (although I suspect you do actually understand and are just trying to rephrase things so it looks like I'm 'attacking' you when that's clearly not the case ). You said 'we can only speak for ourselves'. I changed that to 'you can only speak for yourself'. This is nothing to do with grammar (the grammar monster of the forum would have to tell us if either/both/neither are correct, I don't have a clue!). I had trouble with your statement because it implies a generalised 'this is what being ASD is and this is how everyone with ASD behaves'. That's what I have a problem with, and would have a problem with whoever said it. You can only speak for your experience much of which may be nothing to do with ASD, in the same way I can only speak for my experience. I can't say the way I am is all to do with ASD and exactly how everyone with ASD should be and neither can you. We're all individuals (thankfully ).

[Simberg]

Hi everyone,

 

I'm sorry I didn't reply to some of the posts here sooner - I've only been checking the post every few days, and most of these appear to have sprung up within 24 hours of each other.

 

I'm also sorry that my post seems to have led to some resentment between people making posts - this certainly was nothing I envisaged.

 

It is true that any individual can only speak for themselves, although I think that, in doing so, many people often feel that they are coming from the perspective of other people who share their identity - but it is also often the case that other people sharing that identity may disagree, which in itself poses important questions about what it means to be, for example, 'an autistic individual'. Nonetheless, I'm interested in the perspectives of both people who feel that they can only speak for themselves, as well as of those who feel that their experiences say something about their identity.

 

I hope noone's been too upset by the previous posts, or frightened off from replying. I'd still be very interested in hearing from anyone interested in taking part in the research, or simply in sharing their thoughts about the topics.

 

Best wishes,

 

Joe

[darkshine]

Hi everyone, I've been meaning to reply to this thread for a couple of days now, but wasn't sure what to say - there's something I'd like to say about the tone of the replies... I think the word troll gets thrown around a little too much...

 

Wikipedia definition - In Internet slang, a troll is someone who posts inflammatory,[2] extraneous, or off-topic messages in an online community, such as an online discussion forum, chat room, or blog, with the primary intent of provoking readers into an emotional response[3] or of otherwise disrupting normal on-topic discussion

Philipo hasn't done this - it is purely coincidental that some of his replies do irk people sometimes.

 

I can see why people have responded in the way they have - but it's only cause he left out a few words like saying "in my opinion" or "sometimes" or "I think that..." or even "in my experience I have found such and such to be true".

 

Philipo's response is exactly that, it is his view on it - I understand that people do not want someone to appear to be speaking as though "we all" feel a set way or things, but I guess I am able to read between the lines.

[darkshine]

Hi everyone,

 

I'm sorry I didn't reply to some of the posts here sooner - I've only been checking the post every few days, and most of these appear to have sprung up within 24 hours of each other.

 

I'm also sorry that my post seems to have led to some resentment between people making posts - this certainly was nothing I envisaged.

 

It is true that any individual can only speak for themselves, although I think that, in doing so, many people often feel that they are coming from the perspective of other people who share their identity - but it is also often the case that other people sharing that identity may disagree, which in itself poses important questions about what it means to be, for example, 'an autistic individual'. Nonetheless, I'm interested in the perspectives of both people who feel that they can only speak for themselves, as well as of those who feel that their experiences say something about their identity.

 

I hope noone's been too upset by the previous posts, or frightened off from replying. I'd still be very interested in hearing from anyone interested in taking part in the research, or simply in sharing their thoughts about the topics.

 

Best wishes,

 

Joe

Hi again

 

I'm interested in the research process and what this will be like/involve for the people participating in your research?

 

Best

 

Darkshine

Edited September 2, 2011 by darkshine

[philipo]

i can mostly speak for myself,Thinking about it I can't imagine anything more absurd than a load od asd'rs trying to communicate with each other.

goodbye for ever ,watched many come and go on this forum,its like stepping into a minority of forum members private space ,a parody of people who love taking strong drugs to keep their delusion of sanity.thanks to many members putting up with me ,but i 'd rather stay silent than mix with priveledged dx'd ,i'm definitly towards the chav not bourgise,hope you all enjoy yourselfs on the forum,just keep away from working class people,

Edited September 3, 2011 by Suze
offensive references

[matzoball]

i can mostly speak for myself,Thinking about it I can't imagine anything more absurd than a load od asd'rs trying to communicate with each other goodbye for ever ,watched many come and go on this forum,its like stepping into a minority of forum members private space ,a parody of people who love taking strong drugs to keep their delusion of sanity.thanks to many members putting up with me ,but i 'd rather stay silent than mix with priveledged dx'd ,i'm definitly towards the chav not bourgise,hope you all enjoy yourselfs on the forum,just keep away from working class people,

 

Please stop attacking people who disagree with you and saying insulting things - all i asked of you was just not to be rude - that's not commenting on your background - because that kind of thing really doesn't matter to me.

 

What matters is how you treat people. you can't say such inflamatory things and not expect people to have an opinion on it. No doubt you would have something to say if someone said something you didn't agree with. That's nothing to do with this class war between people on the spectrum you say is happening.

 

I'm not by any means priveliged, i come from a working class background so to call me bourgiouse is sketchy at best.

 

Some people post on here more than others - that happens in practically every contributory site on the internet! I like posting on here because I like talking to people on here - what's wrong with that? If you have really watched people on this forum as you say you have - you will know that have had our fights on here but do you know what? We sorted it out! That's what adults do.

 

The original poster is conducting some really very interesting research - how about discussing that instead of turning this into another argument?

Edited September 3, 2011 by Suze
quotes from a post that was edited

[philipo]

Please stop attacking people who disagree with you and saying insulting things -LIKE TROLL

 

What matters is how you treat people. you can't say such inflamatory things and not expect people to have an opinion on it. rted it out!The original poster is conducting some really very interesting research - how about discussing that instead of turning this into another argument?

.not worth the trouble lets hope you dont all condemn yourselves and your children to a life of drug therapy and behavioural modification.... bye forever its a biological war ,on top of class of course

 

p.s. watch out for rioting chav's when doing your christmas shopping

Edited September 3, 2011 by Suze
personal reference to another member

[matzoball]

.not worth the trouble lets hope you dont all condemn yourselves and your children to a life of drug therapy and behavioural modification.... bye forever its a biological war ,on top of class of course

 

p.s. watch out for rioting chav's when doing your christmas shopping

 

i've reported this thread as it really has decended into something quite toxic.

 

i would like to apologise to the original poster for my role in arguing with philipo. regardless of my taking offence to what he was saying, your research was what should have been getting discussed and I let my emotional reaction to it lead my fingers in the wrong direction.

 

so please accept my sincere apologies, as what has happened was truly not my intention.

Edited September 3, 2011 by Suze
quotes from another edited post

[philipo]

and I apoligise to forum members and would like to jkeep to the origional post

 

The subject of masculine/feminine 'balance/mixture/energies may be illuminating to th researcher,

[Suze]

There have been a number of complaints regarding some posts.These have been edited as they refer directly to other forum members in a derogatory way.Please keep this thread friendly

[Simberg]

Many thanks for everyone's comments on the project - I have received a couple of e-mails about the research, and am happy to receive any further queries, comments, or expressions of interest - please feel free to message or e-mail me directly!

 

Best wishes,

 

Joe

[AndrewBurling]

Have you considered looking in from the child's perspective? Or does the research not require that perspective?

 

Good luck with the research be sure to post the outcome since I would find the results to be Interesting.