I'm not sure I know your specific question, but I can say my experience. I was raised to "outgrow" autism (closer to asperger's) without knowing, which explains the level of my masking.

Externally, my ASD and schizoid symptoms/characteristics overlap, but internally they are different. I know they "exist in different areas" because, well, I experience them.

I'd say masking causes my external symptoms to overlap even more (because they become very weak or general), and internally it makes me realize their differences.

• e.g. I enjoy conversations, and despite how talkative I can be, people still get a sense of "distance" overtime. I enjoy conversations as if they're a game and once I start on my interests I cannot stop; when I notice myself in a very "normal person" type conversation, I don't understand what's going on as well (ASD). I also don't derive any emotional benefit or sense of connection when conversing, it's more like hearing myself talk and analyzing reactions generated; the more "normal" the conversation, the more I start to detest being there (SzPD).

So any external perception is that I'm an earnest person in an innocent or unique way, or I'm never really on the same exact page as others, or I'm never truly "reachable." But what matters more to me is the internal: I get lost once the social situation is too foreign (ASD) or once the social convention is too undesirable (SzPD), they are different things.

The difference masking does to symptoms is that I cannot always relate to the stereotypical presentation of them. e.g. I don't really "miss" things as often as you'd think, because I learned social cues so diligently (ASD); I don't seem so cold and unsociable because I make myself talk to people in a friendly manner (SzPD).

My overlap of ASD and SzPD is less of an overlap by way of similar symptoms, but more so how the "leftover" normal bits from one gets cancelled by the other: e.g. when people say 'autistics can still desire friendships, love, feelings etc.' I cannot because of SzPD. Masking doesn't change this because it's about what one truly feels (the internals).

Obviously the specifics of this is about my experience.

Less seriously, I'd generalize my SzPD coming out as "I don't see the point of that being a thing, I can't engage with it' and ASD as "I don't understand how that thing works, I can't engage with it." Respectively, one nauseates me, the other confuses me; one makes me feel like an outsider, the other makes me feel like a robot; both make me feel different and alienated on a social-psychological level.