You have a good point. I think quite a lot of people who have some aptitude for the sciences and which may do well on IQ tests are often somewhere on the asperger spectrum.

I am pretty sure I have a mild version of it myself. I think there is a connection there. Getting quite good and mentally tricky things can often require a certain obsessession, single mindedness and tenacity about a topic. Exactly the kind of traits more common with someone who has some form of asperger.

I look at how my children develop a skill. Obsessing about something for extended period, is often a good way of getting really good at something.

It has made me sometimes wonder how much of IQ simply comes from having personality traits that allow you to focus a long time on the same topic.

E.g. it would be dificult to develop the mental ability to solve tricky math problems if you are unable to concentrate for a long time on tricky stuff.

I feel this is quite a different view of IQ, from how I imagine people normally think about it. I think the common way of thinking about it, is that IQ somehow reflects a better organized or laid out physical brain. Like some special genes that just makes the brain itself operate more effectively.

In reality it may in many cases simply be pesonality traits which is more effective at pushing the development of the brains capacity for handle typical academic problems. The kind of stuff an IQ test measures.

I also feel I developed my social skills late. But for me it was not because somebody told me to get my shit together, but simply because I developed another obsession with understanding how people think and act. Like I would just start discussing behavior and social situations with people a lot more.