In the past, and still today by some agencies, it has been stated that if you have an IQ of 70 or below you have what I now define as Traditional Learning Disabilities. If your IQ is above 70 then you don't. Right, OK. What if someone has problems with learning and comprehension and they score 68/69 on an IQ test, but later scores 71 on the same IQ test? The problems and difficulties they experience in life with learning and comprehension are still the same the second time they took the test as the first, but yet, according to some people, the Learning Disabilities which they experience have been magically eradicated because they have scored two or three IQ marks higher. Therefore they aren't eligible for help and support from social services and support teams and groups.
The IQ and Learning Disability claim was rubbished in November 1999 with an Autistic child's claim for Disability Living Allowance. He appealed, or someone appealed on his behalf, to the Social Security Commissioners on the grounds that he should be entitled to the higher rate mobility component of DLA on the basis of severe mental impairment. A High IQ was not sufficient to deprive an Autistic child of entitlement of DLA as a person suffering from severe impairment of intelligence within the meaning of regulation 12(5) of the social security DLA regulations. The courts agreed that people with Autism "Suffer from a state of arrested development or incomplete development of the brain". He won the case. A full report of the proceedings can be viewed on this LINK.
That is the problem at least with AS, because someone with it can often talk articulately it masks the vast problems and difficulties that they have in society and life. Often it is claimed that they are intelligent so therefore they shouldn't receive help, support or benefits. People's IQ also determines whether they get support or not.
Scrap IQ tests. Bollocks to them. Are services and support withdrawn or denied to blind people who are intelligent? or deaf people who are intelligent, or mentally ill people who are intelligent? What relevance does IQ have if you are blind, deaf or a Schizophrenic who hears voices in your head? No matter how intelligent you are perceived to be, it doesn't stop these conditions affecting you or your life does it?
The language part of IQ tests, such as verbal communication, present problems for many classically Autistic people, so someone with classical Autism will not do well and will obtain ridiculously low scores which in some cases don't reflect their actual ability. IQ tests don't measure savant ability, such as my calendar calculating. They don't measure musical ability, which many Autistic people have. They don't measure drawing ability, which Steven Wiltshire has. They don't one's measure practical abilities or sports abilities.
I think that it is EQ tests people should have to undertake over IQ tests. One's Emotional Quotient is more important than their Intelligent Quotient. IQ tests only assess the ability to perform a certain sort of test. They do not take into account the individuals ability to function in real life situations - a person with a very high IQ may be useless at basic everyday social situations, yet having the life skills to function socially is more important from day to day than sheer academic ability and that is where I have fallen down.
A person who has an IQ below 70 is classed as being Autistic whereas a person who has an IQ over 70 is regarded as being as having Asperger's Syndrome. Er, what if someone with broken language or no speech at all, who rocks, flaps their hands, and has severe social and interaction problems, scores 80 on an IQ test? They would be classed as have Asperger's Syndrome when that clearly wouldn't be the case. I personally do not believe that human intelligence is measurable because of consists of so many different forms.
Many people with GLD's will score relatively low IQ's whereas someone with AS could score an high IQ but people with GLD's are more, as a rule, socially skilled than someone with AS. Someone with Autism may score well on an IQ test that relies on putting things together, for example, but abysmally low on tasks that require spoken language, because they don't have it present. Many can't concentrate to do any IQ test anyway. They are tests designed by NT's for NT's. The uneven skills that people with Autism and AS have aren't accounted for on an IQ test.
