I´m an aspie, and I read several times that the main disfunction in Asperger´s is in “executive functions”, but I never understand what that means. I know it is related to memery, planning, etc., but I don´t get what is the thing that unify all that things and makes them get in one single “class”.
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Executive function comes down to planning, scheduling and attention – think of it like your brain’s personal assistant.
Its supposed to schedule your time, prioritise your tasks, screen out distractions and get you to focus on important things.
In medicine executive function is affected in many conditions – autism (often the difficulty here is in filtering out stimuli), adhd (organisation and concentration), addiction (behavioural control), depression (often effects planning and motivation).
Another place we test executive function is in elderly people with dementia or other cognitive decline – here we sometimes use things like the “tea and toast test” for executive function – can the person organise themselves and their surroundings to make a cup of tea and some toast. People who sometimes do quite ok on screening tests for dementia (often quite intelligent / educated folks) will be totally unable to do this, showing the problem with their executive functioning.
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