JODIE GOFFE, NOVEMBER 12, 2018

Autism and Gender:

Maybe she’s born with it - maybe it’s socially
constructed?

Last year, on International Women's Day, I attended a talk in Brighton

entitled ‘​I’m Not Rain Man: Women and Autism​​’, delivered by Rebecca
Simmons, an autistic nurse specialising in autism clinics. Since then, I
have been fascinated by how gender and autism intersect - and what this
can tell us about the nature of gender itself.

As I looked further into the subject, I found a small (but growing) amount
of research about the correlation between autism and gender dysphoria.
Women with autism often say it feels like they exist “outside of gender”,
and are unable to understand the importance of gender to “neurotypical”
individuals. It seemed to be part of the “social code” that was
inaccessible for individuals with autism. If this was true - I wondered -
maybe this could prove that gender is
socially constructed? Let us
explore...

Why are there more autistic men

than autistic women?

Autism has always been thought of as a

‘male’ condition that affects boys
more than girls because of various
physical factors. The most prominent
(and ridiculous) theory coming from
Professor Simon Baron Cohen, who says
that autistic individuals have
“extreme male brains”, that allow them to systematise, but prevent them
from empathising - apparently only women feel empathy! Theories like this
cement gendered notions of autism, rather than explain why fewer girls are
diagnosed. Of course then the research, clinical trials, and diagnosis
criteria are all similarly skewed to the experiences and symptoms of men
and boys with autism - not girls.
Recent studies are exploring ideas that girls with autism ​“camouflage”
their symptoms. “Camouflaging” means that, due to gendered expectations
and social pressures to fit in, autistic girls learn to develop certain
social skills which boys do not. Girls play patterns are (stereo)typically
revolved around social interaction and role-play, (playing with dolls,
acting out “mums and dads”, throwing tea parties, and other useful
activities...) and so autistic girls are encouraged to learn and adopt
social rules and customs from an early age. Now, because the diagnostic
criteria is largely based on how autism presents in boysm, camouflaging
makes it extremely difficult to detect autism in girls. ​It is like trying
to spot a leopard by looking for how many stripes they have.

Although some may learn how to skillfully mimic the people around them,
for many autistic women, gender is often understood as a process of
“disidentification”. It is as if they cannot connect their own sense of
gender identity to how society views a women. This is partly because to
the autism been incorrectly linked with ‘maleness’ (thank you Simon Baron
Cohen), and with the bias that follows this assumption. Women with autism
struggle to form an identity while living with a ‘male’ condition. Any
stereotypically ‘autistic’ traits or interests are viewed as masculine and
so are don’t fit in with a female identity. This then leads to experiences
of social isolation and bullying at school, and loneliness and depression
in later life. Many women with autism describe feeling excluded and
bullied by other girls at school, and experience social isolation later in
life by not being able to partake in “female gossip” or “small talk”.

However, new theories are suggesting an important link between gender

disidentification and autism. There is new research that shows that a
surprising amount of individuals with autism identify as queer,
androgynous, gender neutral, or with a nontraditional gender identity. In
a 2018 study of women with autism,
participants provided important
narratives explaining the difficulties of
having to conform to “neurotypical” and
“gender-typical” behaviours, and
described not “feeling like a gender”, or
not being sure “what a gender should feel
like”. Jane Meyerding’s piece “Growing Up
Genderless” describes her experience as a
woman with autism having an “inability to
identify with other women”. She says “I
wasn’t like a girl. I didn’t understand
how they could be interested in clothes,
make-up, dances, dates and boys”.
What is the connection with Gender Dysphoria?

Women with autism who identify as “tomboyish”, queer or non-binary face

the confusing challenge of trying to work out why they don’t identify with
the female gender. A study this year looked at the co-occurrence of Gender
Dysphoria (GD) and autism and found that there was an extremely high
number of autistic individuals with gender dysphoria.

Now, if we listened to Baron Cohen’s theory about the “extreme male

brain”, this might make sense. “Of course! That’s why autistic women
experience gender dysphoria! Because they have male brains!”

Wrong.

G​​ender dysphoria does not just occur in autistic women - it occurs in both
women ​and men. The same study showed that even more birth assigned males
experienced gender dysphoria than birth assigned women! The fact that
gender dysphoria in both autistic men and women suggests that women with
autism are not experiencing confusion with their gendered identities
because they have a male condition or an “extreme male brain”. Instead,
gender is something that is difficult for ​both autistic men and women to
understand, and maybe this is due to the social construction and codes of
gender.

In this light, gender appears as

something that exists ​outside of the
body - something that must be learnt
or adopted. The fact that so many
individuals with autism don’t connect
to stereotypes about their gender
shows that ‘stereotypical behaviours’
for boys and girls are perhaps not
intrinsic.

Doesn’t that kind of prove that gender is a social construct?

Potentially - yes! Sola Shelley, author of “Women From Another Planet?”

said that ​“If gender is a social construct, then autistic people, who are
less aware of social norms, are less likely to develop a typical gender
identity”​​. In this light, autism can be seen as a form of ​freedom from
restrictive gender stereotypes.
Instead of lacking a “female brain”, autistic women feel a lack of ability
to recognise gender as an important part of their lives - it is something
that is part of society that doesn’t make sense. It’s not that they
dislike the colour pink or hate playing with dolls because they have an
“extreme male brain”, but because they have not been as socially
susceptible to gendered expectations.

This argument is exciting. Not only does is go against the neurosexism of

psychologists like Simon Baron Cohen, but it also heavily suggests that
gender is constructed by society.

So… what can we conclude from this?

In addition to gender and feminist studies continuing to call out the bias
that can be found in autism or disability studies, individuals with
neurological conditions can also play an important part in denaturalising
models of gender. Flipping things on their head, there is great potential
for an ​autistic critique of gender​​, where individuals with autism can give
a unique and important interpretation of gender and sexuality from outside
of the social and cultural confines that neurotypical individuals have
been conditioned by. They can question what we have been conditioned to
accept.

In this light, autism can be

reconfigured as “​neurological
queerness​​”, where the fluidity
of gender and expression, and
emancipation from social
constructs and codes ​liberate​​,
rather than restrict,
individuals on the Autistic
Spectrum. This is exciting, and
as more research emerges in
this area, I believe that there
will be a new movement of
people with autism who will
challenge the gendered
assumptions of their condition,
and of society at large, giving
a new an ​important critique of
neurotypical understandings of
gender.

JODIE GOFFE