Autistic Trait Profile Questionnaire

The Autistic Trait Profile Questionnaire (ATPQ) is designed to help you explore patterns of traits commonly considered when clinicians assess someone for autism. Rather than giving you a single overall score, it looks at your experiences across 7 trait areas, including social communication and interaction, repetitive behaviours, routines, focused interests, and sensory experiences.

Many autistic adults begin exploring autism because there are things about themselves they have never quite been able to explain.

You don’t need to already suspect you’re autistic to find the Autistic Trait Profile Questionnaire helpful. You may simply have noticed lifelong patterns that seem different from those of the people around you.

You might be wondering:

• Why do social situations seem to require so much thought or effort for me?
• Why do I find certain changes, interruptions, or unexpected situations so difficult?
• Why do I become so deeply absorbed in particular interests or activities?
• Why do I experience sounds, textures, lights, movement, or other sensations differently from other people?
• Could these different experiences form a pattern, and could that pattern be autism?

The Autistic Trait Profile Questionnaire is a little different from traditional autism questionnaires; instead of asking whether your total score passes a particular cutoff, it looks at the pattern of traits across 7 different areas.

This matters because autism is not defined by one trait. Clinicians look for a particular combination of characteristics across different areas of development and experience. Two autistic people can therefore have very different profiles, even though both meet the criteria for autism.

The 7 areas clinicians consider when assessing autism

The DSM-5-TR diagnostic criteria for autism organize autistic characteristics into 7 areas: 3 involving social communication and interaction and 4 involving repetitive behaviours, routines, interests, and sensory experiences.

Social communication and interaction

1. Social-emotional reciprocity
   The back-and-forth of social interaction, including conversation, sharing thoughts and feelings, responding to others, and knowing how and when to engage socially.
2. Nonverbal communication
   Using and understanding things like eye contact, facial expressions, gestures, body language, and tone of voice.
3. Relationships and social understanding
   Developing, maintaining, and understanding relationships, adjusting to different social situations, and navigating social expectations.

Repetitive behaviours, routines, interests & sensory experiences

4. Repetitive movements, speech, or behaviours
   Repetitive movements or stimming, repeating words or phrases, repetitive use of objects, or particular patterns of speech and behaviour.
5. Sameness, routines & predictability
   A need for routine or predictability, difficulty with transitions and unexpected changes, or having particular ways things need to be done.
6. Focused & intense interests
   Interests that are particularly absorbing, specific, intense, or important to you.
7. Sensory differences
   Experiencing sensory input differently, including heightened or reduced responses to sound, light, touch, texture, smell, taste, temperature, pain, or movement.

For an autism diagnosis, clinicians look for evidence in all 3 social communication areas and at least 2 of the 4 repetitive behaviour, interest, and sensory areas. They also consider whether these characteristics were present during the developmental period, whether they meaningfully impact a person’s life, and whether another explanation better accounts for their experiences.

The Autistic Trait Profile is not a diagnosis. Instead, it helps you explore how your experiences are distributed across these 7 areas.

Take the Autistic Trait Profile

Getting your score is free and anonymous

What do my scores mean?

Each question is scored according to whether your response is more or less consistent with the autistic trait being explored:

Autistic-trait response → 1 point
Non-autistic-trait response → 0 points

This does not mean there is one “autistic answer” that every autistic person should give. Autism is highly variable, which is why the Profile looks at patterns across multiple questions within each area, rather than interpreting individual answers in isolation.

For each of the 7 areas, a score of 6/10 or higher is highlighted as reaching the profile threshold. This simply identifies areas where your responses show a stronger pattern of autistic traits. It is not a clinical cutoff or diagnostic threshold.

You may have meaningful autistic experiences in an area even if you score below 6/10. Likewise, reaching the profile threshold does not mean that you meet a diagnostic criterion for autism.

The Autistic Trait Profile is not a diagnosis and cannot determine whether you are autistic. Your results are best considered alongside your lifelong experiences, developmental history, and other autism questionnaires.

Some people will see strong traits across several areas, while others will have a more varied profile. The purpose is not to give you a yes-or-no answer, but to help you see where autistic traits may appear in your individual profile.

What can I learn from my profile?

Your results can help you explore questions such as:

• Which areas of autistic experience are strongest for me?
• Are there areas I may have overlooked because I have learned to compensate for them?
• Do I have sensory or repetitive traits that I never realized could be related to autism?
• Are my social abilities intuitive, or have I consciously learned how to navigate social situations?
• Does my overall pattern resemble the areas clinicians investigate during an autism assessment?

Informed by established autism measures

The Autistic Trait Profile Questionnaire was informed by established autism questionnaires and research, including widely used measures of autistic traits, social experiences, repetitive behaviours, focused interests, and sensory differences.

Rather than relying on a single questionnaire, the Profile brings these different areas together to help you explore your individual pattern of autistic traits.

How does this fit with other autism tests?

The Autistic Trait Profile Questionnaire is designed to complement other autism tests, not replace them. Different tests can tell you different things about yourself.

• The AQ explores autistic traits across areas such as social skills, communication, attention switching, attention to detail, and imagination.
• The RAADS–R provides a broader measure of autistic traits across social relatedness, sensory–motor experiences, language, and circumscribed interests.
• The EQ looks specifically at empathy—including cognitive empathy, emotional responsiveness, and social skills. Looking at these areas separately can reveal patterns that a general autism measure may not show.
• The CAT-Q explores camouflaging and masking, including compensation, masking, and assimilation. This can be particularly useful for people whose autistic traits may be less visible to others.

Together, these measures can provide a much richer picture.

You might discover, for example, that you:

• score highly on the RAADS–R but want to understand which areas are contributing most strongly to your autistic profile
• have relatively strong social skills on the AQ while scoring highly for masking on the CAT-Q
• experience strong emotional empathy on the EQ alongside difficulty intuitively understanding what another person is thinking
• have particularly pronounced sensory or sameness traits on your Autistic Trait Profile

No single questionnaire captures the whole autistic experience.

Looking at your Autistic Trait Profile alongside established autism questionnaires can give you more information than relying on any one score alone.

What would you like to explore next?

After the AQ, consider taking one of the tests below.

RAADS–R

Measures autistic traits from a different perspective.

CAT-Q

Especially helpful if you think you camouflage or mask.

Ready for clinical interpretation?

Autism Screening Assessment

Understand how your questionnaires, history,

and experiences fit together with guidance from an autistic psychologist.