Strategies for overcoming AS/ASC social interaction problems

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The difference between AS/ASC (at least high-functioning autists) and NT social interaction seems to boil down to only a handful of specific problems. As far as I know there are about four core issues to tackle (if there are others, please mention them). So assuming these can be solved we could all make a lot of progress in improving our social skills and quality of life. . . What I'll do is list these out and elaborate on some of the strategies that I believe are relevant for dealing with them. But what I'd really like is to pool everyone's thoughts, experience, and ideas to sort out the most effective solutions and see where we can learn from each other. So if you have some comments on what might or might not work this would be the thread to do it.

(1) IMPAIRED PROSODY (I.E., STRESS, RHYTHM, AND INTONATION): It's been frequently observed that those with AS/ASC have something off with the sound of their voice; either it's too mechanical or singsong-like. The main issue seems to be with conveying an emotional tone in the voice; which is an important source of information for the listener.

A. VOICE TRAINING: One strategy might be to practice vocal hygiene, develop good posture, use effective breathing, and work on the inflection of the voice. There are many such exercises in existence (see for example, Utterback's "Broadcast Voice").

B. DRAMATIC REHEARSAL: Another strategy I think would be useful is to use dramatic exercises to develop the mood of the voice (e.g., warm/friendly, conversational, enthusiastic, authoritative, clear, sincere, natural, or relaxed). You don't actually have to "feel" the emotion to convey it to others, as most seasoned actors can tell you. To practice this one could select a piece of writing each day and then read it out-loud in the appropriate tone.

(2) DEFICIENT ELABORATION OR TOPIC RELEVANCE: For some reason people with AS/ASC have difficulty in "catching-on" to other people's topics. For example, someone might mention something about a local sports team, or make an observation about the weather. To many of us this probably seems completely irrelevant and so we might not have a response; there is no "elaboration" on the topic. What might happen instead is that we try to steer the conversation to one of our special interests. While that might work sometimes, it generally isn't appropriate or relevant to most social interactions. So those are the two issues: failure to respond or elaborate on a topic, and failure to be relevant or appropriate to the purpose of conversation.

A. TOPIC MANAGEMENT: I think the main problem a lot of us face is that we can get fixated on a few narrow topics to the exclusion of what other people might want to talk about. It seems reasonable then that we should have 1) extensive knowledge of conventional social topics and 2) strategies for topic management.

Speaking for myself, I don't have any problems "elaborating" on a topic when it is one of my favorite interests (as you can probably tell form the length of this post); so there is no deficit here as far as I can tell, merely a lack of interest in general which makes it hard to find something meaningful to say.

The problem of relevance also seems related to this issue of narrow interests. Presumably, something is relevant because it has some direct connection or value to our own lives or the lives of people we speak to. So it might be hard to be relevant if all we're ever concerned about is our own interests. For this reason it might be worth spending a little time getting acquainted with the things other people like talking about. Seems obvious enough, but hard to put into practice.

One more thing to consider might be appropriateness. The idea here would be to trial different topics until one catches on. It could be that the first couple of topics we had in mind weren't of interest to the other person; but if we keep trying out different topics we stand a better chance of landing on something enjoyable.

(3) IDIOSYNCRATIC/UNCONVENTIONAL USE OF LANGUAGE: The problem here is with using words that are either 1) too technical for the other person to understand, or 2) too personal or subjective for the other person to grasp. For example, I tend to reject a lot of common dictionary words and up meaning something more obscure, such as when I use the word "happiness" to mean the highest purpose or fulfillment of life, rather than the more common sense view of happiness as positive emotions. I also use a lot of technical words in contexts where people probably have no knowledge of those terms.

A. DEMOCRATIC SPEECH: Considering the problem above, I've found it useful to use a vocabulary that most people can understand and agree to. This basically comes down to watching my language for "big" words, and using common-sense meanings when I express myself. When I do need to use a more technical word I tend to paraphrase it with a brief definition. Depending on your current vocabulary, a useful habit might be to learn the words people use in everyday conversation, and then follow the language conventions. A related point is to control the length of speech. So if most people use no more than 5-7 word sentences you might want to do that too.

(4) IDIOSYNCRATIC/UNCONVENTIONAL USE OF BODY LANGUAGE: This is the same problem as (3), but applied to nonverbal communication, specifically gestures and facial expressions. So rather than using words in strange ways it is more that behavior seems unusual (e.g., making eye contact or smiling at the wrong time). This problem is made all the more difficult since a lot of body language is unconscious. For this reason, consciously trying to imitate others might come off as forced or artificial.

A. MIMICRY OF SOCIAL BEHAVIOR: One approach that seems relevant is social mimicry or behavioral modeling. The idea being that you select a number of prototypical role-models (e.g., from real life or a movie) and try to imitate their facial expressions, gestures, or body posture. I have yet to try this myself but it seems promising; especially if you role-play the behavior with other people who can give you feedback. If no one else is available or willing, a mirror or video camera could probably work just as well. The hope is that through repetition the body language of the model will become second-nature or at least more spontaneous.

B. PERFORMANCE VISUALIZATION: Once you know the body language you are trying to perform it may be worthwhile to visualize how it might feel and look in a real interaction. Since new behaviors are difficult at first, trying them out in everyday interactions might be the wrong place to experiment. However, clearly imagining the behavior beforehand should make it a lot easier to perform later-on, when you're in a real interaction. There's a lot of research out there showing this as an effective intervention (for example, search for "covert modeling," "imagined rehearsal," or "performance visualization").

Have you read kfisherx's thread on her experience with a social training program for adults?

http://www.wrongplanet.net/postx153181-75-0.html

I feel like this can drastically improve our outward apperance so we can put on a more NT apperance but it wont eliminate many of the difficulties that many aspies have. It doesnt always mean we know what to do in a social situation. For example, when it simply boils down to social apperance, vocal skills, body langauage, eye contact, facial expressions...I have a friend who is as proficitent as I am but know what to do and what not to do in a social situation...hes way way better.

For example: if u asked us to go into a room with 1 person whom we've never met and make conversation for say 15 minutes, we'd probably perform similarly. But u asked us to go to a social gathering with tons people which requires more skill in talking to a large amount of people, entering and leaving conversations, talking in groups, initiating conversations, keeping track of a large # of people with tons and tons of small talk, he'd outperform me by a lot.

Good stuff!
This is exactly the type of thing I was looking for.


It seems to me what we're really talking about is the complexity of different types of social interaction. In a one-on-one case, as per your example, you and your friend might have similar outcomes since you both have the same basic skills, but in the more complex case, group dynamics, a different or more versatile skill-set might be required, and so your friend manages to outperform you. If that's true, doesn't that imply that your friend is simply operating at a higher level than you're normally accustomed? As if you're working with algebra while your friend is working with calculus; or perhaps one-on-one interaction is like gymnastics, while group dynamics is more like football. Assuming that, it might be more a question of mastering the right prerequisites before moving on to more complicated social terrain, than of some innate deficiency.

It seems to me what we're really talking about is the complexity of different types of social interaction. In a one-on-one case, as per your example, you and your friend might have similar outcomes since you both have the same basic skills, but in the more complex case, group dynamics, a different or more versatile skill-set might be required, and so your friend manages to outperform you. If that's true, doesn't that imply that your friend is simply operating at a higher level than you're normally accustomed? As if you're working with algebra while your friend is working with calculus; or perhaps one-on-one interaction is like gymnastics, while group dynamics is more like football. Assuming that, it might be more a question of mastering the right prerequisites before moving on to more complicated social terrain, than of some innate deficiency.[/quote]

I think ur original post was more like strategies in how to better fool people into coming off as NT and not come off as outwardly awkward. Many aspies already fool people as it is, me being 1 of them. Sure I come across as pretty normal surfacewise but when you dig deeper...there are tons of gaps in my social understanding. Is that what your orginal post was about? Too me your post was more like a "how to be NT".

I dont really know what you mean that my friend is simply operating at a higher level then what Im normally accustomed to. I guess you could say he has a much stronger skill set then I have? In terms of just set communication skills were pretty similar. When it comes to just regular functioning in knowing how to talk to people, what to do what to not do, what to say what to not say, controlling the image hes giving off, reading people, etc. Hes very skilled and he fools a lot of people. Many people probably read him as less socially ept then he actually is, my guess is that people give him slack because they think hes an international student. He reads people better then most people, its pretty scary.

Alright, last post for the night. If you mean that imitation is fooling people, I partly agree and disagree. It's pretty well-established that NT infants/young children learn social behavior by imitating their parents or caregivers. Children with AS/ASC do this too, but to a lesser extent due to an abnormality in language/social development.

The line between what is "natural"/"spontaneous" and what is merely an outward performance isn't very clear. Is it natural/spontaneous when a 5 year-old child pretends to be a cop or an astronaut? They give some of the outward expressions, but there doesn't seem to be anything innately "natural" or genuine about their behavior.

It would be my view that adult NT social behavior comes off as natural as a result of these early experiences in imitation/role-playing. Over time the performance becomes second-nature and seems to pop up out of nowhere; but it has a clear line of development; we just can't see it. So when it comes to adolescents or adults with AS/ASC, many of these early opportunities were probably missed, which is why learning it for the first time can come off looking outwardly awkward. That doesn't mean you're being fake, it just means you need time to internalize the behaviors and make it a part of you. Besides, I've known a lot of NT's in my life, and many of them have told me they feel like they're acting a lot of the time; they're just better at it.


Well you've pretty-well described a great social actor, as you said, he fools people a lot of the time. You didn't mention whether or not he is an aspie or NT. If he's AS/ASC then that just proves the point that these things can be learned. If he's an NT then doesn't it show that he's performing and not being "genuine." I'm really suspicious of this idea. I seems the only thing that makes someone authentic or not is how convincing the performance is; how natural it looks; but all that shows is that they have a lot of experience behaving in that way. And yes, I think he has certain skills or knowledge that you don't have. He knows how to work a room and read people's personalities, for example. He might not know how he does it, but that doesn't imply that what he's doing isn't learnable.

Edit: One final point. I don't see aspies and NT's as being so different. In the area of social interaction NT's have a definite upper-hand; and so it would be worthwhile, in my opinion at least, to learn from that. Aspies, on the other hand, can be a lot more technically-minded and creative; something NT's could learn from us. So I don't think this should be framed as us versus them, as if one of us is inferior or superior. But since this is about "social skills and making friends" why wouldn't we want to be more NT? At least in this area? Personally, I don't really have a choice, 99% of the people I work with are NT; so I need to adapt myself to them, as much as I might hate it.

I know what your saying, NT behavior is based on roles, imitation, etc. Its really second nature to them. Even tho most NTs are imitating to some extent, they at least know the reasoning beneath their actions. Whereas an aspie could just do a certain behavior and not know the reasons why a certain behavior is performed. As an aspie...I can be in a social situation and socialize...I can read their outward reactions...but I dont know the specifics of how my behavior is affecting the situation or why things are going the way they are. I dont know why people are acting the way they are. Whereas NTs even if its fake, they at least know how doing this affects the situation.



Ok maybe I phrased my words wrong. I actually do think he is being himself mostly in the way he portrays himself. He's the only person I know who is blunter then I am at times. What I was trying to say...he has clever ways of getting away with the same type of behavior I could never get away with. People assume see him as this rascal, teasing little brother type image plus every1 thinks he's a foreigner which he can get away with even more. He is NT. The only reason why I know that he knows very well with what hes doing is cause he helps me sort out social situations at times. He will point really small things out about my behavior in a situation and in that situation he was completely acting like he was paying attention.



Being that Im 1 of the very few aspies at my school, I try not to do the NT vs aspie thing. NTs are so diverse afterall. What do u mean by creative? Yes I do try to adapt myself to NTs and its not easy trying to deal with social situations. I dont really know what Im doing a lot of the times and it gets so fustrating because I become paranoid that I did something wrong. I am very unaware of what my actions are giving off. This whole being social in a community is still very much a mystery to me.

I think it's only the most experienced of NTs that are able to articulate their reasons. There are a lot of NTs who are good socially, but who have only a limited grasp of how they do what they do. To use another analogy, we could think of social skills as being a lot like chess.

When you first begin to play chess you need to learn all the principles and rules of the game. This is the level of the novice chess player; at this stage it's easy to understand because the principles and rules are explicit and mostly unchanging (e.g., bishops move diagonally, and without passing through other chess pieces, or the idea that you should get a piece or position advantage over the other player, aim to control the center of the board, and so on). So these type of rules and principles are mostly invariant or slightly less static. . .

However, at this level the novice still has a lot to learn; specifically, tactics. The difference now is more a question of contingency with the sequence or structure of the game. That is, the moves you need to make aren't generally true; they depend, or are relative to the shifting goals of the players. This is the level of the proficient and grandmaster chess player; at this stage the moves are much more complex and defy any specific formulation/codification. Skilled players are working mostly off intuition and pattern recognition; which they've built up over extensive practice and experience. It's no longer consciously trying to follow the rules of the game, and is much more about "seeing" the right sequence of moves, or having a "feeling" for certain patterns in the game. It seems to me this analogy is nearly equivalent to social interaction; except that the rules were learned at a much younger age; and unconsciously.

While many of us might have a good analytic understanding of social interaction, its the extensive experience, pattern recognition, and intuition that we've failed to acquire to a proficient or competent level. Almost as if we're stuck at an earlier point in development. I've read somewhere, not sure where, that people with AS/ASC have difficulty dealing with change and unpredictability. If you think about it, this would explain why most aspies and HF-autists are drawn to patterns, regularities, and systems. Social interaction, often times, is too novel or unpredictable to easily categorize in a formal way (e.g., you don't always greet people, sometimes it depends on the situation, people's moods, body language, etc). So given that, it might just be that we're overwhelmed by complex social interaction because we can't grasp all the subtle patterns and rules. To do that it seems we need a lot of practice and a very nuanced understanding of people, social expectations, and so on. This is very different from saying that we are innately lacking in some fundamental, hard-wired, social understanding; since it implies we can consciously work out the patterns through analysis and experience.



I think most aspies are creative, though I could be wrong. What I mean is that we're generally good with seeing things in unique ways, and so we come to problems creatively. While most NTs might approach problems in a conventional or typical way, an aspie/HF-autist might come at it from a complete different angle, using very different kinds of knowledge. So being innovative, crafty, and ingenious seems pretty characteristic of AS/ASC.

I'm sure a lot of NTs face the same problems you've mentioned here; not really knowing what to say or do is pretty common for a lot of people. But we'll never really know exactly how since we're coming at it from an AS/ASC perspective. This is usually known as the problem of "other minds." We know what it's like to be us, but not what others are like. We can only infer that from our own experience. The problem is that if our own experience is radically different from others we cannot make that inference. Luckily for NTs, they are generally alike psychologically, and so can infer people's behavior because it is similar to their own. But it's not mind reading. . . Empathy (perspective-taking) for other minds is nothing more than an "assumption" that our own inner states are reflected or experienced by others. If most people thought and felt in a similar way to ourselves we'd be just as good with empathy as an NT.

Edit: One last brief comment. I'm not advocating being more NT, if that means being more superficial or less yourself. What I'm trying to get at is the difficulties in competence that a lot of AS/ASC people experience in social interactions. I'm very content being different or eccentric, provided I can be competent in expressing myself. That's a subtle difference. You don't have to be like everyone else. It would be better, in my opinion, to violate people's expectations by simply being yourself, except that the person that people see as strange or unusual is still someone they can respect or appreciate; I don't find this is the case in most situations since often-times there is a subtle disrespect; which I find intolerable. In other words, there is a positive or socially appropriate way to be unconventional/eccentric; one that signals inner strength, intelligence, and competence, rather than the reverse.

So far from what Ive picked up, true NT interactions are based heavily on imitation from what they've seen there entire life. NTs are able to approprietely read what another person is conveying and respond approprietely. What you said was correct, social interaction is much more complex for a lot of us then set patterns. There are much more complex patterns in NT social interaction. There still there according to whatever culture your apart of. Thats why sometimes my behavior will throw people off, my friend says many people, "dont know what to make of that". The tricky thing about many aspies, we dont come across as obviously impaired...we just might seem very odd. Its not like this person doesnt know how to socialize, its like this persons being super annoying, a weirdo, extremely nerdy, bitchy, obnoxious, rude, whatever.

I do agree with the creativity statement. We can think from angles which many NTs just dont go there. I go around wondering about things that my NT friends never go there. I had this discussion with my friend the other day. I am in a very unique situation where Im learning social norms at an older age then 99% of the population where at the same time I can critically analyze the social norms of whats going on therefore I can see things others cant. Most people had social norms ingrained in them in preschool, elementary school and at that age, kids just mindlessly take things in and dont think about it. I see a lot of things that other people dont.

Alright. In light of the discussion above, one additional problem area in AS/ASC social interaction has to do with social norms and expectations. What might be some practical strategies for dealing with this? I'd like to remind everyone that the purpose of this thread is to identify the specific issues people with AS/ASC face in social interaction, and to get clear about the strategies that might be employed to address them. There are no right or wrong answers at this point. The idea is to brainstorm, identify specific AS/ASC communication problems, and make suggestions as to how to solve them.

In case I wasn't clear above, there are two components to a strategy: (1) it addresses a clearly defined goal (i.e., overcoming one of the five or more problems in this thread); and (2) it outlines a particular exercise or activity for achieving the goal in question. So for example, if the problem is being unhealthy, and the goal is to achieve better health, then a potential strategy might be cardiovascular exercise or a nutritional diet. So it isn't about being overly precise in the details of these strategies (we're not talking about tactics, as per above), but rather to single out the best paths, methods or approaches to use in addressing problems of language, social interaction, and behavior.

ADDENDUM 1.0

(5) DIFFICULTY WITH SOCIAL NORMS/EXPECTATIONS: People with AS/ASC tend to have an insufficient understanding of what to say or do during social interactions (i.e., what do most people, NTs, expect in social encounters? What are the norms we should be aware of?) As a starting point, it's worth observing that these activities seem highly ritualized, and therefore there must be specific patterns or regularities that can be learned. From my perspective, there are at least three things we need to understand. The first is casual conversation or "small talk." The second is people's desire to have their identity esteemed, respected, or recognized by others. And the third, which is tied into the second, is how politeness or friendliness impact communication. Clearly, these social rituals or patterns of behavior are meant to put others at ease; to support others in feeling safe in expressing themselves.

A. SMALL TALK: Casual conversation is undoubtedly the hallmark of NT social interaction. The goal here seems to be to maintain a light back-and-forth of seemingly trivial or superficial talk. So how can we learn to do this more effectively? One potentially useful exercise I've seen on this is in kfisherx's thread on Social Skills Training for Adults (apparently I can't link it at my current membership level). In it, Karla's trainer used a turn-based game where the objective was to play one of several color-coded cards accompanied by a conversational action (e.g., red for "chiming-in," or green for posing a question). There are other rules to the game, such as using less than three statements in a single turn; refraining from terse or one-word replies; and discussing "safe" topics. A lot of aspies tend to either miss their turn, hit on controversial or "dangerous" topics, or go into too much detail than is appropriate. So intuitively this sort of game fits perfectly into an approach for learning small-talk.

B. FACEWORK: Someone's "face" is a sociological term for a person's social identity, honor, or dignity. According to Brown and Levinson (1978), face "is something that is emotionally invested, and that can be lost, maintained, or enhanced, and must be constantly attended to in interaction. In general, people cooperate (and assume each others cooperation) in maintaining face in interaction, such cooperation being based on the mutual vulnerability of face." So in other words, people assume certain social roles or identities, such as being intelligent, friendly, or high status. This forms the core of that person's self-image, and so they have a vested interest and desire to have this part of them appreciated, validated or recognized through social interaction. Failing to respect the others face is what generally leads to hostility.

So what's the strategy here? Generally, we would need to recognize when our actions are face-threatening. So if someone sees themselves as being kind and considerate, and we treat them as being superficial and stupid, obviously that's going to create problems. So identifying face-threatening acts is part of it. The other part is to employ politeness strategies (discussed below) in order to support the person's sense of identity, and freedom of self-expression.

C. POLITENESS: To gain some understanding of all the subtle tactics involved in being polite, and how this addresses a person's face, I'd recommend people read Joan Mulholland's "Handbook of Persuasive Strategies: A Practical Language Guide." In it, there are over one hundred specific politeness tactics, broken down according to their purpose and value in social interaction. Each tactic is framed as an action, so for example, being polite might imply that you: (1) "admit debt"; (2) "agree"; (3) "attend," (4) "be direct," (5) "claim group identity," and on and on. I've found this extremely useful for myself, so I'd suggest it to anyone else looking to improve the quality of their social life. I don't think it would be an overstatement to say that the majority of social problems for aspies and HF-autists is in the area of being polite.

That's all for now, hopefully others find value in approaching social interaction problems in this way. What would be nice is if we could all build a handbook of sorts, a kind of go-to-manual for AS/ASC social difficulties. So if you have some ideas, or if you disagree with some of the suggestions in this thread, by all means comment and give your opinion

Just adding some tips pertaining to the subject matter.
1) Dont go on and on about the same thing
2) Look engaged even if ur not
3) Respond in the way a person might expect. Ex: If your friends talking about how they enjoyed something...dont diss the activity.
4) Timing is crucial...I still havent figured out the logistics behind that
5) If your more advanced learn how to "work the system", do subtle things to get people to do or react the way you want them to. This 1 is beyond me.
6) Try not to sit there and say nothing, add a comment here and there
7) If you think a topic is inappropriete it probably is, dont mention it unless you know the person well.
Dont randomly jump to irrevelent topics
9) If the conversation has already shifted topics, dont go back, (bad habit of mine)



I found it was helpful to get a mirror and imagine potential social situation and practice how your face might react, so you can convey the appropriete facial expression at the right time.