Najakcharmer
Posts: 2121
Joined: 5/3/2004
Status: offline
|
quote:
ORIGINAL: CitizenCane
I'm not sure I've seen this in other's posts yet, so I want to say that AS people frequently have difficulty translating verbal communications into appropriate actions, especially in the social sphere. However, they tend to be very responsive to being 'walked through' something. If you demonstrate, or guide them step by step, they generally adapt very quickly and tend to retain whatever it is very well. It's not that they don't 'understand' the verbal communication intellectually, but often that understanding doesn't make the next step to real changes in behavior, etc, unless someone helps them 'do it right' in a very explicit fashion. AS people are usually very verbally adept, but there can be an odd and frustrating gap between that and the sphere of action.
From the AS point of view, you have it dead on except for this: I need to be walked through your expectations in a completely literal, deadpan and factual manner, not because there is a gap in my understanding, but because there is a gap in your communication. I am not psychic and I do not speak your bizzare, contradictory and non-factual emotive version of the language. I don't understand your culture-specific allusions to "like you should" or "what is proper" or "an appropriate length of time" or "just the right distance". Minutes, seconds, inches and feet please. I'm not from around here.
I am completely blind to the social cues that you read like an open book, so if you refer to them and expect me to use them as landmarks, that's like telling a deaf person to wait until he hears Beethoven before doing something that you want him to do. You'll be waiting a long time.
quote:
Be very careful of what habits you instill in an AS person, because they are likely to be very hard to modify later.
Yes and no. Oddly enough, if someone tells me on Monday that they appreciate it when I do X, but on Friday continuing to do X is no longer appreciated, it's annoying and surprising to me. Now if behavior X is explained situationally rather than generally, and all of the conditions under which X is good and all of the conditions under which X is bad are clearly covered from the beginning, we are very unlikely to have a problem. If an unanticipated situation or a context comes up that modifies a rule, all that is necessary is clearly explaining the situational modifier and how it applies.
The problems in communication between NT's and AS's that I see happening most often are:
1. The gap caused by the NT assuming that the AS can correctly apply general social rules we are given to specific social situations that have modifiers in place including factors that we have real difficulty predicting and calculating for. Be factual and precise please, and you'll get the results you want.
2. The gap caused by the NT using language and landmarks that are not clearly understandable to the AS. It is rarely productive to tell a deaf person to use Beethoven music as a cue. However most people understand that deaf people cannot hear music and consequently wouldn't be ignorant enough to make this suggestion. Unfortunately AS is much less well understood, so I often see NT people telling AS people who are "mind blind" and literally unable to see or sense other people's motives or emotions to use these things as cues for correct behavior. Surprise, it doesn't work.
I'm aware that it can be extremely frustrating to deal with someone who is literally blind to the social cues and nuances that you can read and understand effortlessly, where you must explain in endlessly precise micromanagement terms what is socially appropriate and what is socially inappropriate. It is equally frustrating on the AS side to deal with people who try to communicate with cryptic games and coded ritual babble instead of just saying what they mean, and who constantly expect you to perform a feat that is the literal equivalent of responding to musical cues when you are partly or completely deaf.
Whose "fault" is it when NT's and AS expectations clash? Most likely neither, or both. If you're an NT, it's a mistake to arrogantly blame the AS just because you're "normal" and they're not. Of these two sets of brain wiring, a lot of us who are on the AS side like ours a hell of a lot better and feel that it adds rather than subtracts from the richness and satisfaction of our life experience. It is the responsibility of both people in the communication, not just one, to speak in a way the other can clearly understand.
|
RE: D/s and Asperger's Syndrome - 
Profile
Personally, i find it almost impossible to follow conversations with a lot of background noise/multiple simultaneous discussions, so keeping him on the "outskirts" of more chaotic gatherings may help. As Najakcharmer mentioned, a difficulty with facial recognition can also be an issue, so if you have a LOT of people flitting around your world, a quick run-down of who is who (based on outstanding traits and/or what they're wearing that day), and why they're important/different/interesting, will give him a head start at a social event. 
I may have some degree of sociopathy along with Asperger's. It's a good thing I do have a conscience, or at least a significance sense of ethics along with a stiff dose of common sense and a logical regard for consequences. I suspect that my personal set of wiring may be just slightly to the left of "potential serial killer". Fortunately I am much more interested in professional accomplishments than in any possible benefit of committing antisocial acts. 
New Messages
No New Messages
Hot Topic w/ New Messages
Hot Topic w/o New Messages
Locked w/ New Messages
Locked w/o New Messages
Post New Thread