Table 4. Phenomenological overlap of relevant differential diagnoses of AS that involve abnormal social interaction.

	AS	Schizoid PD	Schizotypal PD	AvoidantPD	Social phobia	Obsessive PD	OCD	ADHD
Social interaction	●	●	●	●	●	●	●	●
Core manifestations of autism
verbal communication	●	●	●	●	●	●	●	●
facial expression/gestures/prosody	●	●	●	●	●	●	●	●
eye contact	●	●	●	●	●	●	●	●
theory of mind	●	●	●*1	●*4	●*4	●	●	●*7
empathy	●	●*2	●	●	●	●	●	●*7
interests/rituals/compulsions	●	●*3	●*3	●	●	●*5	●*6	●
Accompanying manifestations
attention	●	●	●	●	●	●	●	●
psychomotor function	●	●	●	●	●	●	●	●
self-injurious behavior	●	●	●	●	●	●	●	●
psychotic manifestations	●	●	●	●	●	●	●	●
Long-term manifestations
social interaction in childhood	●	●	●	●	●	●	●	●
biographical stress factors	●	●	●	●	●	●	●	●

●usually abnormal; ●usually normal; ●potential accompanying manifestation

;^*1 suspicious-paranoid misattributed; ^*2markedly restricted affect; ^*3e.g., intense preoccupation with fantasy, magical thinking, or violent scenarios;

^*4 hypermentalization of other persons’ irritation, criticism, or rejection; ^*5intense preoccupation with order, lists, and formal aspects; ^*6egodystonic character; ^*7due to attention deficit.

AS, Asperger syndrome; PD, personality disorder; OCD, obsessive-compulsive disorder; ADHD, attention deficit–hyperactivity disorder;