Experience-based distinctions in autistic traits

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I'm talking about people who can actually do this for decades and decades without the slightest sign of burning out, not people who simply don't recognize burnout (of which I was one for a really, really long time).

Not a defense mechanism, at least I'm uncomfortable using that word for something that's possibly unique to autistic people.

What I mean is... autistic people often seem to have limited processing power available for various abilities. Some autistic people (me included) adapt to this mostly by having abilities that constantly shift from one to another. When I have one ability, I may lack another twelve, but I may have access to one of those twelve if I get rid of the first ability.

Then there are autistic people who seem to adapt more by ending up with a very stable set of things that they can and cannot do. It's not that they couldn't have turned out with a totally different set of priorities (and by priorities I mean which abilities are prioritized, nothing at all to do with the normal definition of the word, nothing at all to do with any conscious choice). It's that they somehow need to lack certain abilities in order to gain others.

For instance, many autistic people can either understand tone of voice, or understand the meaning of the words the other person is saying. And so many will end up with a long-term adaptation where they permanently (or for a really long time) don't understand tone of voice, and do understand the meaning of the words. But it could just as well have gone the other way if for some reason their brain had found tone more important.

My brain finds tonality easier than language comprehension, but since my abilities are flexible rather than rigid, I can temporarily switch into a mode where I understand the language but not the tone or just about anything else. Interestingly enough, when I do that, my emotions often also recede and resemble the less emotional people that are being talked about, because language comprehension is being prioritized above everything for that moment. But then the moment I stop trying really hard to understand stuff, everything goes back to normal for me, which is being emotional, understanding tone, and not understanding the words.

A person with a more rigid set of abilities and a more permanent set of tradeoffs may be like I am when I understand language, only all the time -- understanding language, but not tone, and not being very emotional. (Note that there are people who do understand language and are more emotional, but there are also people who seem to need to make some kind of tradeoff between language comprehension (or some other ability) and emotions. We vary in what combinations of abilities we can get away with at any one time, which means there are dozens if not hundreds of combinations possible.)

I hope that makes a little more sense.

Donna Williams's book Autism: An Inside-Out Approach discusses this at more length. If you don't want to get that, she writes about it a little in this PDF file:

http://soeweb.syr.edu/media/documents/2 ... lliams.pdf

Look especially for stuff regarding "forfeits" -- she distinguishes between people who make long-term forfeits (what I'm talking about with at least some people who seem to forfeit connection to their own emotions on a permanent or semi-permanent basis), as well as people who are in a constant state of forfeiting different things in order to access other abilities (someone more like me, whose abilities are constantly shifting in ways that I have only some degree of control over). I do have a general preferred way of functioning (by preferred, I mean my whole brain seems to prefer it, not that it's my choice), but I also shift around a whole lot more than most people do.

Yeah, that also has gotten easier for me, as compared to when I was a kid. It felt like having a razor-thin margin between "ok," and 'drowing.'
I actually didn't like being compared to Spock, but at the same time found bursting into tears all the time embarrassing.


I've actually wondered the same thing. I've had numbess/lack-of-feeling problems that seem related to bad periods of long-term shutdown (no PTSD in my case). Depression also seems mixed in, but I have yet to really sort it all out.

Erg, there's another aspect I've been trying to write out but can't get into a coherent form. It's basically that in my teens I remember times of feeling like I had so much "left-brain" activity happening that there wasn't much left for emotion. And it weirdly seemed like the burnout/long-term-shutdown that happened later actually reduced that, because it reduced my capacity for as much "left-brain" thought. But I'm feeling like there are subtle distinctions that current language/terminology (for autistic experiences) aren't adequate to describe, and I'm too tired ATM to figure out a way around that.

But overall, the notion of people being hyper-sensitive in that way, and then getting overwhelmed until it goes offline does seem very plausible.

Yes, it does make a lot of sense. Thank you very much for taking the time to explain. I will read the PDF and might buy the book.

(numbering is my own)

(1) My eternal question is why people differ in their 'good' intentions. Some folks tend to think of themselves they have all the knowledge to judge over others and themselves, thus often missing the point of their original intentions declared. I think aside from obvious psychopaths (technical term), real-life people constitute a continuum from being extremely altruistic to being extremely selfish/egocentric. My problem is that no matter how I try, I can not see the subtleties of this quality per se (in itself). They are often mixed up with personal traits that include, say, autistic traits too.

Thesis: This above continuum is an immanent parameter of every people, autistic or not, and to analyze a person's autistic traits one must measure this parameter virtually first independently to others.

Anti-Thesis: This above continuum is highly effected by the context and complexities of other personal traits (including autistics), not to mention environmental impacts.

I just dunno. Truth may lie somewhere in between. I have a very bad experience regarding my passed relationship and a friendship, I still have disturbances in my heart, have never cried in my life so much over anything else. So, for practical reason, this above question is very important to me, I think.

(2) I know this could be seen as a highly functioning stuff, but I feel communication is an essential parameter when putting someone on the coordinates of autism. This include the ability to put thoughts into words, and after this making oneself related in interactions. This is actually two parameters tied together. ST-SCP seems freaking good to me at this.

(3) About anbuend's original parameters. They are reasonable, but I feel they overlap a little, more stable senses highly correlate to solid, stable abilities, with the former being the actual causal parameter. Conceptual Thinking vs. Sensory Experience is interesting to me, I think I was always closer to conceptual thinking. I suspect a connection to ADD/ADHD, although you promptly can tell me I imply outer approach here, which I don't. I think I was always affected by these. I believe the ability to focus mind activities at will is the core of both ADD/ADHD and Conceptual Thinking. In other words, being able to differentiate between sensory inputs allows selecting what information to process. Processing is a natural consequence of the inputs selected. Conceptual thinking is a result of selected informations that are processed according to think-schemes built on different types of inputs. There is a positive feedback in the model. The more you can select the more you can build think-schemes. One can argue that the ability to sense accurately comes first, so the range of information available is highly determined by the way it perceived. In this case, sensory experience is like a reflection of the reality in a curved mirror, which logically imply deviations from sensing reality at all levels.

I don't understand what you are suggesting about ADHD and conceptual thinking.

The core of ADHD is, as I understand it, a lack of self-regulation.

Intentions are rarely obvious to anyone, NT or Aspie. Intentions are instead inferred, based on behavior. And behavior is something that is expected. Autism stands out against almost all other un-common cognitive related disorders because people with Autism do not look abnormal or different in any easily observably way. Therefore Autism behavior is not expected to be different from that of the average person. The same behavior by someone with Autism and someone with Down Syndrome will be inferred to be due to different intentions. Unexpected behavior by the person with Down syndrome will be excused by perceived lack of intelligence or knowledge. But unexpected behavior by someone with Autism will be inferred to be of malicious intent.

People expect everyone that looks similar, to act in a similar way, and they are easily frightened when they see someone who doesn't fit that pattern.

I can be both. I think I started out as the creative/ emotional type but developed some logical traits along the way, or it was laying dormant for the first 20 years of my life.

I am definitely the prone to shutdown/burnout type. Sensory, I would say, despite my issues seeming severe to me that I will only be the first type. I've got synesthesia and epilepsy so I can have jumbled sensory experiences too. And in the third category I can be both, but predominately conceptual.

As for executive dysfunction, well I have to write to-do list each morning and took meds just to participate in this thread.

A significant symptom/trait for me would be fear of change and a need for sameness. That is the way I've been my whole life and I think I could overcome almost every symptom but not that. The other symptom being becoming more social. But change is what I have the most problems with. It can be a slight deviation from the routine to having to go to another town I've never been before. I can either become restless or have a full blown meltdown. Lately I've been really trying to not explode. It completely disrupts my life and holds me back from growing up and makes miss out on having a lot of experiences that I may find enjoyable.

I think another important trait would be what people call intense world syndrome, which does take sensory issues into account but what really sticks out more is feeling the emotion of others as just a presence that can be mood altering, even suffocating.

I'm definitely logical/hard/cold/robotic. Despite this, I feel strong affection to relatives and friends in long term. Long term means that I way delayed realizing what I feel toward someone, it can take years. I have to fight myself through obvious obstacles that distort the picture how I should perceive intentions in them. I'm not very empathetic to colleagues seemingly, but I do care for them and feel empathetic, only I can not show it on occasions I completely miss the need or just feel too awkward to do so.


I can relate to how you describe executive dysfunction, I think a rather similar way than you. I suppose my symptom may be a little less severe than yours as I sought challenge in my life and could take changes without much of anxiety. Keep in mind that I had a very supportive family and friends.

It is difficult to me to reason by my suggestion. One of the instructions I have been told most frequently in my adulthood is "Don't say you can't do it, always say you can!", so I'll try. At least I practice to myself, if nobody reads it.

Lack of self-regulation is what I call inability to focus thoughts. Self-regulation is how it appears on the level of perception by the contemplative. When it's less severe, one can think she/he has not enough energy to pay attention to certain exercises like listening to a boring presentation or learning at home etc. On a more severe level she/he experiences difficulties with keeping clean her/his apartment, starting and finishing projects like renovation of the apartment, buying new furniture etc. The continuum can be further extended to more severe problems. This is a bit simplified, since maximalism also counts, but basically true.

To cope with this problem both the ability to focus thoughts and thinking-schemes (conceptions) are required. One of these thinking-schemes might be 'If you do this and this, you achieve that and that.' or, on lower levels, 'If you can recognize that those patterns you see or hear are this or that, you just have learned something about the word around you.' What I tried to point out in my post that this thinking-schemes can only be built up via systematical sorting out of informations. Sorting out information requires the ability to focus thoughts and/or senses (in my model I do not separate this two that much, bc they share the same root, I suppose). This inflicts catch 22 on the less abled. Only senses remain. Otherwise, there may be a positive feedback, but not sufficient enough, in this case thinking-schemes (conceptions) remain relatively undeveloped. This paired with limited ability to focus thoughts results in ADD/ADHD. Ability to hyper focus is explained by the relatively detached stance and the natural need of the mind to search for tasks, combined with the limited feel for doing something 'worthy' caused by limited thinking-schemes.

I also wrote about an alternative explanation that implies distorted senses (reflection in a curved mirror) will never show the 'proper' image of reality, i.e. how nature has made the mind of the majority of people to do, so it is impossible to achieve the level of conceptual thinking of NT's given the circumstances of our word. (italic for the added condition)

Huh. Hope there are not too many grammar errors.

Last edited by OJani on 30 Mar 2011, 10:07 am, edited 1 time in total.

I don't think I understand what you are getting at, which is probably my own limitation, but than you for the explanation.

I think conceptually (but not in language) and I have a bad time coping with ADHD.

Now we see ADD/ADHD is simply caused by the inability to focus thoughts or focus on doing something. It's self-regulation, as you say. I've suggested the idea to split it into two parts.

The cause of ADD/ADHD is basically two things: one is a 'disorder' of the mind, the inability to focus on thoughts or senses (vision, hearing, tactile etc.), the other is more a consequence of the first, as it is about the cognitive side of the perceived senses. This cognitive side is a structure of 'thinking-schemes' in our minds that are formed during our life (by the way, these schemes are less verbal on the 'lower' levels, I think). The more someone can deliberately select information (i.e. the data that her/his senses provide her/him) the more she/he can build such structures. I think this is the part that least understandable. Such structure works as a catalyst, helps our cognitive processes to decide what input is relevant and what isn't. This process is partly conscious, but there is a part of it that lie deep in our subconscious. This is ok, since we are not always aware of things that our minds process for us, yet they are products of cognitive processes.

It is important to mention that one can have a very developed ability to deal with complex ideas such as very good conceptual thinking. I certainly tend to think very abstract. Yet, when it comes to reality, these ideas are often short of practical use. We may say they lose relevance. This is another story. We tend to hyper-focus, yet are not capable of coping with life as well as, <cough>, NTs do.

That is rather abstract and I seem to be having more trouble with abstract recently. I am having a lot of difficulty connecting what you are saying to how I perceive my thought processes as working, for example. Except the bit where you talked about not being able to attend to particular stimuli.

I can't understand all this stuff either.

I am pretty certain that the conscious thought vs. sensing/instinct thing has little to nothing to do with ADHD, which can exist in someone with either kind. It has nothing to do with the ability to focus or inability to focus.

Maybe you are right. I just can't accept that my ADD/ADHD is purely a biological problem. It basically is, but I consider its consequences on the formation of the ways my brain does thinking. People may look at things or problems in different ways.

Oh yeah, ADHD can totally be a different way of thinking, I just don't relate it to what I said about the interpreting/sensing distinction, because it's not related to that (both/all kinds of people can have or lack ADHD).