Asperger's Syndrome and Misbehavior
Silvia Hierro
Gen 200
3/10/2014
Ann Zommerfeld
Introduction

Asperger’s Syndrome is often misunderstood by the community members. People often see an individual with Asperger’s Syndrome as irresponsible, impulsive, intolerant and defiant. These can create so much stress among them that can cause them to experience meltdowns and often act out without taking complete responsibility of their acts.

Asperger's Syndrome and Misbehavior

According to Woodbury-Smith and Volkmar (2009) definition of Asperger’s Syndrome is as follows “Asperger syndrome (AS) is a chronic neuro-developmental disorder of social interaction, communication, and a restricted range of behaviors or interests. Although not usually associated with intellectual disability, the severe social disability and, in many cases, associated mental health and other medical problems, result in disability throughout life” (p. 1).

In a perfect society, individuals must follow a code of conduct which will help them with decision making and how to handle different situations fairly and legally. Each person in the community is expected to follow rules, to take responsibility for their acts and mostly accept consequences that will come from those actions.

In few words, personal responsibility means being accountable for what we think, say and do. It is based on what we believe for, our values and morals.

Asperger Syndrome, along with some parents is creating an epidemic of bad behavior and these individuals are not taking responsibility for the acts. Autism is a condition, not an excuse to misbehave in social settings or to reach a degree of education without any effort.

Regardless of the diagnosis or situation, when parents allow their children to behave unacceptable and to follow different rules than others, they are allowing them to hide behind a diagnosis, seeing it as an excuse. Children with Asperger’s syndrome will learn to be manipulative, believing their behavior is normal and believing everyone to accept it as such. People with Asperger’s Syndrome are extremely smart individuals, with extremely high IQ’s ; but if we do not teach them as early as toddlers – if they are diagnosed early enough- to accept responsibilities for their acts, they will not be accepted in our society, which is critical and expect the best from everyone.

Sometimes, families are able to provide resources and therapies to their children, get involved with their education and support them in any way possible. Unfortunately however, they keep allowing their behaviors to happen probably to make it easier on them as families without taking any responsibility for their actions.

In many cases, these children are completely capable of continuing their education to superior levels and be extremely successful. Parents with children in the spectrum need to be aware that the experiences our children with autism will experience in college will not be different from their “neurotypical” peers. Living away from home, the responsibility for time management, the academics expectations, new social cues and responsibilities inside and outside the classroom and to the academic challenges that college involves are some of the challenges they will experience.

To be successful and to take control of post-secondary education, individuals in the spectrum must learn from an early age through therapy and other services, to be organized, to recognize their weaknesses and strengths and to utilize them in their favor which is the most important thing in my opinion. Individuals must learn and demonstrate they are able to fit in and be responsible for their acts knowing the difference between right and wrong even when they feel