Theory of mind

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I've come across that before. The two people who understand me best are a friend of mine who knows he is an aspie (and who unwittingly introduced the idea to me that I might be one too) and a friend that I seriously think has AS. Also in the case of the second, I get his jokes more readily than most people do.

I think there's a common trend there. Which gives me the idea (if I'm beginning to understand ToM correctly) that it's not that we have a lack of ToM, but that our Theory of Mind is different from most NT's and apparently similar to each other's.

But in some things I have. I've been a reader. I can put myself in the position of a reader. I do that to some degree when I write, and even moreso when I proofread what I've written. How I'd read it if I were the reader instead of the writer.

The classic "Theory of Mind" test, with the moving something while someone is out of the room is that kind of thing. It's really thinking about what you would know if you were the one who left the room. If I were out the room and something were moved in the room, I wouldn't know it. And realizing the other person has that perspective, rather than seeing what I do in the room.

I can do that too. I was thinking more in terms of things you have no good perspective for. I can't really put myself in the shoes of someone who likes cottage cheese when I can't stand it. I can't envision cottage cheese going into my mouth and not being appalled by the taste and texture. I can understand that someone else has a different experience but I don't really empathize. I can empathize only to the extent that I can imagine they might like the cottage cheese in the same way that I like another type of food that do I actually enjoy eating. Empathy by analogy I suppose.

I'm often frustrated in life because I DO experience things differently than other people, yet sometimes other people refuse to accept that. I have sensory issues that most people don't have. They can't imagine having those issues so they think it's weird. They think I'm being inflexible simply out of stubbornness. They have a different experience so they don't empathize.

They also don't empathize with the autistic child rocking and flapping. They can't imagine themselves doing those things so they don't see the purpose of it. If a behavior has no purpose in their mind they assume that they can train the person not to have such behaviors. Yet they are wrong about that. Also, people always assume that animals don't experience feelings to the same degree that humans do just because they don't have the same reasoning capability. They only assume this because they don't have as much empathy for animals as they do for people. Animals are just too different from us. They don't think about problems and operate primarily from instinct. That makes it more difficult to empathize. Europeans used to think that Africans were closer to animals than themselves because they couldn't relate to their more primitive culture. They could justify slavery because they lacked empathy. They didn't ever have the experience of being black or being enslaved and thus they were able to block out the obvious immorality of what they were doing.

I like that idea, that we have a different theory of mind. Not that I don't still think that some of us sometimes fail to use theory of mind. But, yeah, we have different ideas of how minds work.

Thinking about one probable aspie I know, I had a lot of confusion with him because of expecting him to act and respond like an NT. But, it wasn't from a sense of how NTs think. It wasn't a theory of mind thing. It didn't having an idea of what's in his head; it was about what I understand about what people communicate and what that means. I'm used to NTs. But when it comes to having to understand thinking, there I have a much easier time understanding people on the spectrum than I do NTs.

I've read that this tends to happen with a lot of us outside of movies too, that we'll often pick up mannerisms that are thoroughly dependent upon who we happen to be hanging around. I think it was listed on the "you might be an aspie if" page, the idea that you couldn't be entirely certain "who you would be" if you were in a different group of people on a given day. I think conformity like that happens to everyone, but it seems to be something that aspies notice more, so maybe we actually do it more or it's more pronounced.

That makes a lot of sense. It explains why I can fit in with so many different groups of friends, different groups of people, but have seen them clash if I ever brought more than one group (or a person from each group) together in one place. I can fit in with each group on a singular level even though they're very different, but sometimes have a hard time introducing friends in one group to friends in another without them clashing and me ending up feeling utterly helpless in the whole situation.

Yeah, that situation blows. I'm not sure if I've ever been in that situation myself though... I haven't tended to introduce people to each other.

I suppose I have a different ToM rather than no ToM. People say I'm oblivious to their sensitivities but when I discover what their sensitivities are, I'm amazed because I would've never imagined them. Sensitivity to one's beliefs being challenged, sensitivity to exposure to new insight, sensitivity to truth (rather than white lies), sensitivity to looking inside oneself, etc. I'm so different from most people.

Wea re all a little different, thats why we are here at WP isn't it?

Indeed.

I get irritated when I have to explain things multiple times, because I don't realize that I'm not being understood.

I'm horrible at buying gifts for others, and I often have to ask other people when the person in question decides to say "Well, I don't want anything...." <----That is annoying tbh

I can also relate to what Bella1 said on Page 1 of this thread.

I empathise with animals a lot, sometimes even better than people.

I can say hello to a cat or horse or pet them and know that I'm not going to receive a ton of abuse or be yelled at.

I can read animal's body language better and know if they're happy or upset better than most people. If an animal is upset or mad, I can anticipate what's going to happen and can calm the animal down better than I could a human.

I've felt like Dr Dolittle sometimes lol .

If someone's riding on horseback, it's the horse's face that I'm drawn to first. Or if someone's walking their dog, the dog always acknowledges my presence first, so my eyes are automatically drawn to the dog's face.

The animal becomes the focus of discussion: I feel like I have something genuine to talk about. I love animals and have made a lot of friends with people who care for and keep animals.

They too have felt empathy for animals, some of them were even training to be veterinary nurses.

I can't say hello to other people as well I as can to animals though: not unless the people in question are very good friends of mine or I'm regurgitating phrases from a phrase-book when I go abroad as a tourist.

Last edited by AmberEyes on 15 Jan 2009, 6:07 pm, edited 1 time in total.

First of all I'd like to say hello to everyone. It feels great to know that there are forums for aspies to talk about the issues that are important to us. Issues that those who are NT may not notice/care about.

This has been a problem for me for quite some time. Even before I found out that I had AS eight years ago I'd get on topics that I was really into and not really notice that the others around me wanted to talk about something else. I think now at this point I have gotten to the point where I can appear to be "normal" whenever I go outside or to work. If I can offer any advice to our fellow aspies out there I'd suggest that getting to know the people around you can go a long way. In that manner then I believe that a lot of conflicts with theory of mind can be prevented. I realize that because of AS we tend not to socialize that much and if we do we tend to take over the conversation.

That's why I have learned to always ask what others are thinking before I jump in. That way they don't feel offended and they are more likely to continue talking with us.

This lack of empathy for animals horrified me when I was little. I couldn´t believe this world we lived in, and how it was set up (by humans). I remember, as a child, feeling very separate from the human race, and trying to understand why things were the way they were. I was even upset that people used their lawnmowers to cut the grass, wasn´t that hurting the grass? (Plus I disliked the squareness of lawns, the shortness of grass, not to mention the loud lawnmowers- but that is a different story). Anyway, I notice, in regards to "empathy", that most people have a very selective empathy. In addition, if they want to (mis)use animals or own slaves, probably the only way they can justify their cruelty to themselves is to decide that the person or animal doesn´t "really feel it". Boy, did I ever really get upset when I was younger, and I kept hearing those very words spoken by adults!

Same thing in times of war, of course. The "enemy" is subhuman, or "evil". The powers at be use words like "collateral damage" to talk about death. It´s a psychological ploy, and it´s used a lot. But I´m surprised so many people seem to fall for these things.

Welcome to Wrong Planet! (Are you new?)

Yes, I used to do the talking at people, dominating conversations thing too, though I wasn´t aware at the time that it might be irritating. In recent years, I have made an effort to really listen to people. I think it´s helped a lot.

That is a more modern tactic. It used to be that in war you were fighting for a cause, and it was much bloodier than today, and people had the knowledge that this is not something that bothers me. Today we have become too sensitive to the loss of human life, and too sensitive to violence when necessary. The news here in Canada was comparing the deaths over in Afganistan to the deaths during the bloodiest battle of WWI and how unecessary these deaths are. Hello? there haven't been as many Canadian deaths in Afganistan in total as there were deaths in that WWI battle in any one day! At that time, the war was bound to happen and I'm on a tangent. Anyways, world war 2 was different, the German leaders that had organized the holocaust were no longer human at the point that they ordered it or followed out those duties in my opinion, and therefore did not deserve to be treated as humans. WWII was a horrible thing, and a perfect example of how some people can be human by species alone. No true human is capable of the kind of attrocities that were committed during the holocaust.

Hmmmm....... that was really off topic. Anyways, my rant for the day.