Echopraxia

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Echopraxia

There has already been a thread about this, but there weren't many replies so I decided to make a new one.

Does anyone here have echopraxia? If so, for how long have you had it, how severely do you have it and is it caused by your autism or something else?

Personally, I have seemingly strong echopraxia. I cannot remember not having it. I cannot even just be myself when talking to people because I always imitate someone else's voice, accent, behaviour etc. I also quote TV lines and repeat vocalizations made by others...

Not me especially but NT family members sure do this all the time.

Also: isn't this evidence to contradict the "lack of mirror neurons causes lack of empathy in autism" hypothesis? Or maybe the mirror neurons here are or a different kind, or their input not processed as they are in NTs?

Well, having Echopraxia doesn't mean you're empathetic.

Yeah. I just meant that it requires mirror neurons (which are linked to on that Wikipedia page) to mimic people, and mirror neurons are also supposedly the "cuplrit" in empathy or lack thereof. But either that's wrong or the mirror neurons function differently in the process of echopraxia vs the process of empathy.

I made a living for more than 30 years mimicking voices. While I was in radio, I specialized in character voice commercials, doing celebrity voices or cartoon characters. It's hard for me to hear a distinctive voice over and over on a television show without picking it up. Sometimes I don't even know I've acquired one until I find myself using it out of the blue, usually because of some distinctive 'hook' or catchphrase that seems appropriate in the moment and suddenly its just there.

Whether or not both involve mirror neurons, I don't think there's much connection between Echolalia and the autistic shortcomings regarding empathy, though there's probably something similar in the process of developing 'coping mechanisms' and learning to fake one's way through NT social rituals.

This is an interesting thread. It's discussing theories and ideas I've yet to encounter, and has made me to decide that I will do more research.

Echolalia is the repetition of vocalizations while Echopraxia is the repetition of movements made by others.

My father does this. Some phrases are also overused which I've heard him say for e.g. 4 years and every day; not constantly but once a day at least. I think some which he uses that often are used involuntarily and it's a tic. He even says himself he just can't stop it.

yes of my ex girlfriend its annoying.