Edogawa Ranpo ASD Analysis

Detailed Analysis

• Reduced Sharing of Interests and Emotions: Ranpo's constant smiling and lack of apparent emotional sharing make it hard to discern his true thoughts and feelings.
• Difficulty Adjusting Behavior for Different Social Situations: His behavior remains consistent regardless of social context, such as acting silly at a formal party.
• Highly Fixated Interests: Ranpo's intense focus on detective work, often to the exclusion of other topics, exemplifies this symptom.
• Significant Impairment in Important Areas of Functioning: Despite his intelligence, Ranpo requires assistance with tasks like riding trains.
• Not Better Explained by Intellectual Disability or Developmental Delay: His high intelligence rules out intellectual disability, and there is insufficient information about his childhood to suggest a developmental delay.

DSM-5 Diagnostic Criteria for ASD

1. Reduced sharing of interests and emotions
2. Difficulty adjusting behavior for different social situations
3. Highly fixated interests that are abnormally intense
4. Symptoms cause significant impairment in important areas of functioning
5. Symptoms are not better explained by intellectual disability or developmental delay

Ranpo Exhibits the Behavior of Someone with ASD

For 1 "difficulty with social interactions and communication" in untold origins Ranpo came to the conclusion that everyone was a stupid idiot and announced that to the whole theater, which leads me to believe he has a hard time with social stuff.

For 3 "reduced sharing of interests and emotions" you can't really tell what Ranpo is thinking because he's always smiling.

For 7 "difficulty adjusting behavior for different social situations" after the cannibalism arc at the black tie party we could see Ranpo acting like his usual silly self instead of being polite and fancy.

For 8 "trouble making friends or lack of interest in peers" in untold origins it seems that Fukuzawa was Ranpo's first friend.

For 12 "highly fixated interests that are abnormally intense" Ranpo's main topic of interest is detective work, and he talks about little else.

For 15 "symptoms cause significant impairment in important areas of function" despite his extraordinary intelligence, Ranpo cannot ride trains and needs Atsushi to help him.

For 16 "symptoms are not better explained by intellectual disability or developmental delay" Ranpo shows extraordinary intelligence so I think that rules out intellectual disability.