Animal Affinity

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I love smaller animals, scared of big ones like horses and cows. I espicially love cats too. I like cats better than humans I socialize better with cats, know their "language". I prefer the company of my cats over people.
Some dogs like me, some hate me, usually those which don't like children.

Children seem to like me too, or more like, they are not scared of me. I could not scold a child if I wanted to. When I try they laugh at me, they don't respect/fear me. They feel safe around me. If a child is lost it will come to me, cause I'm not a dangerous person.

Horses are my favorites, next would be dogs, not really a cat person.

I like and get along better with animals especially dogs much better than I do with most other people.

Wow...

I thought there might be a connection between the autism spectrum and animals; but this is amazing. I know most people feel they understand animals; but the way you people are describing it sounds just like my own story: Animals seem to know you; you can learn (or already know) their languages...

Besides Temple Grandin, has anyone actually researched this? It might really bear looking into--especially since it seems to be a way of communicating that NTs haven't quite got the hang of, and since communicating with other humans is the prime problem for most people on the spectrum...

I wonder if contact with animals could help a non-verbal autistic person learn to communicate? Not necessarily by way of speech; but communication of some sort... If you could learn to communicate (or were naturally able to communicate) with animals, could that serve as a bridge to communicating with humans?

Enough philosophizing; here's a funny bit about my feline connections: I recently realized I squeeze my eyes shut when I smile! This is, of course, a cat's way of saying it is trying to be polite by not making direct, prolonged eye contact; and perhaps that it likes you and feels comfortable around you.... Somewhere along the way, I've picked it up; and now I combine the feline smile with my human smile. I wonder if the NTs think I have a tic?

the only additional question I would ask, am I the only person that babys and small children just seem mesmerised by?

TechnoMonk: They seem to stare at me a lot, too. I, unfortuantely, am creeped out by small children. They bother me a lot, so I try to stay away from me.

Callista: I have been thinking about it, actually; one of the things I am currently seriously considering as a career is as an animal behaviorist (although I plan to focus on canids, not livestock as Grandin did) and that would be a good thing to focus on. (I also would love to study correlations between white factoring and temperament in domestic animals--I have a hunch that it correlates to tameness or possibly neoteny, not irregular temperament as Grandin believes.) I don't know of any autism-specific studies on animal behavior, though.

I have a strong animal affinity (IMO) but when I was a child animals were scared of me, and would run away from me, bark/hiss at me, or bite me.

As an adult I seem to bond very well with cats.

i studied veterinary sciene at uni and i enjoyed the animal behaviour lectures.
i have a knack for dealign with cattle and cats and can manouver around cattle and work aroun them without gettigmn them too upset. i have close daily contact with cattle and i do get kicked a lot , but i would get kicked more if i didnt have an aspie manner.
cats i can clinically examin and cosult very rapidly due to my manner, and i can give worming tablets to cats first time..you only get one go with cats.
i enjoy pigs behaviour as well.
pigs arent dirty stinkign animal they are smart inteliogent animals as well.

No.

I love dogs...

I have an english setter and a yellow lab. They are so wonderful. My setter just snuggles up to me, wraps himself around me and becomes a living teddy bear. My little lab likes to play so we do a lot of that too....

I also help animals at work. For example when my company needs to test medical equipment we do it by caring for needy animals. The animals get repaired and the fda is happy with the data.

cats like me. Even skittish ones have to come sniff me after I've been around a while, and sometimes curl up in my lap for no apparent reason. I understand their body language well-- much simpler than people body language, really. Mostly it's in the ears and tail... (maybe if people had mobile ears and tails, they would be easier to understand).

I am also inexplicably popular with 3-8 y.o. children, and often the under-3 set finds me fascinating as well.

OTOH, birds do not like me, and I have learned (after being bitten by two parrots, chased by angry ducks and chickens on multiple occasions, and mobbed by seagulls) not to like them. I'm a bit scared of them now, actually.

My first love of animals was...stuffed animals...they were my best friends and guardians.As an adult I get to have live animals and love my two cats and bunnys alot.They make me laugh out loud(something most two legged critters cant do), and I love to touch them, which they allow when they are in the mood for a snuggle.I't is a good thing they restrict me or I would have worn off their fur by now.....I love fur.I thought of trying to find a job with animals but many pay poorly and some medical stuff would be hard for me to handle watching the animals in pain and not being able to explain to them.(I watch those animal cop shows because I love to see the animals get rescude but they end up killing alot of them!That would be very stressful.

As far as the autism animal connection...I have seen shows about this.They use Dolphins and Horses to bring some autistics into contact with the out side world.It has been effective as far as the shows emply, but I havent seen any actual statistics about this.

One of my biggest moral delimas is...I eat animal products.I think it is inhuman how most animals are "farmed" and killed but I havent been able to stop craving meat...maybe, someday.

Feed them whenever you come around....and they'll be your best friend, I promise you.

Birds have no loyality to anything other than their stomachs. So their "love" has to be bought with a tasty bribe or two. I've had the good fortune to work in office complexes that had ponds stocked with geese and ducks. After showing up with food several days straight, I had them eating out of my hand and following me around because they trusted me so much.

i understand this, i live and work in th euk and we have very high standards of farmed animal welfare, i inspected a free range broiler chicken farm th eother day, i felt at ease watchign the chickens peck and scratch, only chickens but idecided to eat more organic food after seeign this, it is more expensive but i felt good at this farm.

I love to goto the zoo. My favorite animals are tigers, otters and wolves.
I haerd of a book by Temple Grandin that talks about a connection bettween aspies and animals. She says that both think in pictures rather than words and are able to understand eachother because of this. I just wish i knew what the book was called.

the book is called animals in translation.