ABSTRACT
People with AS have a great ability to develop special, narrow, obsessive interests, which often involve an accumulation and categorisation of knowledge and facts about a particular area. These interests, according to the diagnostic textbooks, are an 'encompassing preoccupation or restricted patterns of interest that are abnormal in either intensity or focus'. The clinician has to make a subjective judgement about how extreme the interest is, whether it is just an excessive hobby or if there is a repetitive adherence, consuming enormous time, disrupting daily life and limiting the person's social opportunities. Girls seem to have less obvious special interests than boys and these might include animals, particularly horses, or the science fiction books about Harry Potter. Often the more stressed the person's life the more pronounced the special interest becomes. The special interest is also enormously pleasurable experience often greater than many other pleasures in life. It is possible that some special interests become sources of employment.
