Can you tell if a person is talking to you or someone else?

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I have trouble with this a lot. Once I was at my friend's family's house and her dad said "are you okay, sweetheart?" and I go "oh sure I'm fine" and at the same time someone else responded I guess I should have realized he wasn't talking to me by the fact that absolutely nothing was wrong with me, lol.

i always go through that i hate it cause i feel like a idiot.

I think you need eye contact to tell if someone is talking to you. Since I don't do eye contact or pay attention to where the other person is looking, I can't discern whether they're talking to me or not. If I'm at a point where I can understand speech, I often assume they're speaking to me if they're within hearing range. If I can't understand speech well, I don't respond at all whether they're talking to me or not. Whether they're actually speaking me has little bearing on whether or not I respond, it seems.

everyday I spend averagely 10 secs to figure out if one is talking to me. I have this problem since I know Im alive.

This is a big issue for me. I usually have no idea when someone is talking to me. Once, I was at a bus stop and this girl was like "hey come here" and I thought she was talking to me and she kept saying it. I was freaking out thinking; how does this girl know me?, why is she asking my to go over there?... you know how it goes. Anyways, she was really talking to someone walking down the street that I never noticed. Another time, I was in class and my teacher was talking and I was totally oblivious, looking around like "who is he talking to?" and it was ME.

Gah, I often have that problem. I usually do respond at this stage in my life. When I was a kid, I used to ignore people's greetings even when they were obviously talking to me, because I just didn't feel like interacting. This drove my Mom crazy, and she taught me the importance of returning greetings. These days, I respond to greetings more often than not, though I will sometimes look around to see if there's someone else in the general vicinity the greeter is likely to be speaking to. It's especially difficult, because I have sometimes actually been greeted by people whose faces I don't recognize. Thus, I can't always tell whether or not I've met the person who's given the greeting. If I haven't had the chance to establish a degree of familiarity with a person, I most likely won't reliably recognize said person's face.
I recall a time within the first couple of weeks of my freshman year of college. I was walking somewhere, and a girl said "hi." I didn't see anyone else there, and I didn't know whether or not I'd met this girl before. I returned the greeting. The girl stopped in her tracks for a split second, remarked, "Odd," then turned to a person directly behind me, and launched into a conversation with that person. If only that were the most awkward moment from that time in my life.
I've had plenty of similar moments. That one stands out, primarily because that was a time in my life when I was trying really hard to start over and reinvent myself as a "normal" girl. It became really clear I was failing miserably when the head of Student Life callled to inform me that several of my suitemates had come to him about me; that there were things I'd been doing which caused people to be "concerned" about me.
But I digress. My point is, I can definitely relate to this.

i often have this problem too.

I've thought someone was talking to me and responded only to learn that they were talking on one of those hands-free cell phone headsets.

I had that as well, someone saying "After the break.". I just asked "What did you say?" and when she started repeating I knew what she meant, now she just needed to finish that line again, because she thought I didn't hear her.

I'm like this a lot too, yeah.

I can have this problem too. There are a few quick ways to determine it.

1 - People around as you mentioned. Are you the only person?
2 - Who is the person looking at? Eye contact helps, but I rarely make eye contact so I try to determine by the angle of their face in general.
3 - What is the context? Context can help a lot of course. For example, having just entered a place, you might expect a greeting.
4 - Who are they approaching? Generally, people will approach those they are greeting, unless of course they're behind a desk of some sort.

I've ignored people too, because I don't want to look stupid for responding to something not directed at me. That just makes me feel worse though, so I try to determine the situation. Either way, I end up feeling sick from anxiety. Best to stay at home!

I just hope you don't have difficulty with determining if somebody is talking to you directly online or not! I know a guy who has problems with this. Out of eight random people in a room, and my friend not having said a thing in the room, he sends me a PM asking me if this one guy was talking to him or not. The context was clearly not directed at him. I'd hate to have that much trouble with it.

Lol, yeah I often respond to misdirected comments

I used to have problem with this, but it was so embarrassing answering people who hadn't been talking to me that I learned to check it out before saying anything - just a glance at the situation has usually proved enough to clarify things.

Umm i used to, but not very often anymore (mainly because i keep my inter personal contact group tiny).

Tips:
1) practice observing, eventually you catch on to the little indicators like where they're looking, if they're facing you or not quite, if they're trying to make eye contact.
2) practice some more.
3) practice alot more, expect mistakes.
4) have a handy "feelings saving" line ready, if your not sure dont reply.

re 4:
scenario, you hear "heya" you dont know if its for you, the guy next to you or anyone else in the vicinity even after checking by looking at the speaker abit, it SEEMS to be for you, do not answer, watch for a frown or displeasure expression.. if someone else answers and the greeter seems okay/happy, it wasnt for you.. if they seem displeased, issue your feelings saving line.

a good one is "oh.. sorry we're you talking to me? i was miles away" (miles away = slang for in thought/distracted).

if they say "no" just try a smile and "alright, have a good day anyway".

NTs have wars and fights because they cant communicate effectively under their own social protocols, so we're not going to get it right all the time XD

if you wish to engage in real time discussion, wear ear cupping headphones and place a microphone on the table which has a sign on it that says "please use the microphone to talk to me or i will not hear you". then there will be no quandary