My opinion of our social issues.

Post Reply New Topic

So, Aspies and etceteras are apparently excellent at noticing fine details (at least in some areas);
and in heightened perception input (over-stimulation is a part of this);
and faster perception input (from some study posted on here that I can't remember where);
and faster processing (again, at least in some areas);
and usually causes us a melt down is too much input.

So why is it automatically assumed that, "We're not seeing/noticing..." social/facial/body/tonal input?

NTs (and often ourselves) are pretty sloppy with their communication. We see this "sloppiness" everywhere else with them so why is it that we automatically assume that their facial expressions and body language is suddenly so wonderfully and perfectly efficient?

So My Opinion is that we're seeing too much, that we're seeing more than is intended.
My Opinion is that this sloppiness -especially when viewed by our fast, high tuned, and ultra-focused attention to detail- creates a glaring ambiguity for us.

People often talk without thinking and obviously get confused when the listener doesn't immediately verify the content of what they think they mean to be saying.
Especially when the listener is us.
When we (Aspies and such) show confusion AND an openness to to being wrong, they seem to solidify that we ARE wrong.
But they never really seem to know why so they just say it's obvious, and we believe them.

Here's an example that the automobile drivers among us may understand.
Lets say that we come to a Stop Sign and there is no Stop Line painted on the road.
Where exactly do we stop?
Where exactly is the point where one would get a traffic fine for "running a stop sign" and the point that was intended by law?
Many NTs are like: well, uh, just stop about there!
If they even stop at all, rather than merely thinking they did, they might just slow down and call it good, if they get called on it they may very well insist forever that they stopped, damnit!! !

This ambiguity is what is happening to us very often I believe, and much less often are we "blind' to their details. (probably only after a meltdown gets started)

I also believe for some of us that have "face blindness" the cause is for similar reasons.
If NTs identify people by say 75 facial features (I don't know the real number);
and we notice 200 individual features;
we could end up with a 100 feature overlap -making two people look the same- without even touching the NT's 75 features (with a 25 feature margin) that make the two seem superultraclearly different to them.
So we've learned to never really trust that we're seeing the same person we saw yesterday.

^ that's quite inspired

we are always torn between the abyss of nothingness and the inferno of overload

Nice one. That is pretty much the way I currently see it, and have posted more than once that I think NTs make more assumptions, and get away with them most of the time, so they don't realise they were wrong or somewhat inaccurate.

I haven't heard many NTs respond to this hypothesis though, and would be fascinated to hear their thoughts.

Yup.

Well, I'll give some kind of NT perspective here =/ I don't know that how I do things is at all typical though.

For me, it's like people are surrounded by strings of motivation, reaction, logic and emotion all of which tug them in different directions. The effect or pull any of these different factors has varies from person to person. When I try to judge what someone will do, I add up very quickly and almost automatically everything I know about them, their body language, what they said most recently, what I know them to be feeling currently and my estimation of what motivates them. I have been told that personally I am very good and sometimes scary at this, probably because I think I tried from a young age (I used to be very bad at seeing these connections) to become good. For me it was a matter of reducing the anxiety I feel around people.

I don't know how to compare the amount of detail and connections that you see and I see. You may be right about you seeing more: I don't know. Frankly I doubt that either of us do: the only perspective any of us can every truly speak for is our own. I do think that your way of looking at it is at least empowering and carries with it the idea that people are actually able to improve at reading each other which is a good thing, I think.

I agree that it is important to remember that everyone is fallible when it comes to reading people. Actually, one of my favorite questions to ask other people is "What are you thinking?" I started to ask that when I realized that I sometimes beat myself around the head trying to read the unreadable. Then I thought, why shouldn't I just ask? What's the harm in asking? So I did, and it works well. Frankly I don't see why more people don't do that. There would be far fewer misunderstandings then.

I easily agree that NTs often talk much yet say far less than they think they do. I know one presenter who seldom even forms a sentence. I notice that more than others do, but expect that I'm almost blind to other channels of information. I know that I learn very little by watching others work or play, compared to NTs. I'm busy making mental models based on a few observations and the relevant engineering, or focused on an irrelevant detail when the action happens.

Where I see a stop sign with no line, I know that I have to stop at a point where I have a clear view of cross traffic, without obstructing it.

The odds of a face match tend to go down with more points of comparison, as I understand the problem. The problem is seldom mistaken identity, but an emotional novelty that changes the personality behind the face. Women in particular are likely to be unapologetically inconsistent. This arises from having to multi-task when dealing with children, which leads to more frequent errors and corrections. Throughout, the mother feels infallible, because on average, her judgement is better than that of her children.

I like this theory; thank you for posting it. I also appreciate the words "unfiltered vs. filtered", which describes my experience (in general) very well.