”Who am I meant to be?” In search of a psychological account of autism from the viewpoint of an insider

This paper critically reflects upon the most recent attempts to build a psychological explanatory model of the autism spectrum, from the positionality of an ‘insider’. This paper contains an overview and critique of the three dominant theories of more recent times: ‘theory of mind’ deficit, executive dysfunction, and weak coherence theory. Followed by a critique comparing and contrasting two of the most recent models attempting to explain the ‘enigma’ (Frith, 1989), namely: empathising-systemising theory (Baron-Cohen, 2008) and monotropism theory (Murray, Lesser and Lawson, 2005). All these theories attempt to explain what the essential difference is, in the autistic state of mind at the cognitive level of abstraction, yet how accurate are they when viewed by an ‘insider’ who has been so diagnosed? A major criticism of the majority of these models that is highlighted in this paper, is that they are formed from a perspective of a cognitive paradigm overly restricted by its total adherence to scientific positivistic method as the gold standard, are often blind to the theories of social psychology and sociology, and are thus restrictive of the ‘autistic voice’ being heard. The theory of monotropism is a welcome departure from this theoretical dominance however, largely basing its account in subjective accounts. In so doing, this theory is more applicable to the vast array of subjective differences experienced by autistic people.