Autism and empathy

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That definitely seems likely.

I agree with this 100%

I think I'm good with some areas of emotion but no idea about others. If that's what you meant.

It also depends on what you've experienced in life. e.g. when my dad died when I was 13, my teenage friends had no clue how that felt so they just told me to shut up and stop trying to get attention. But when my period started, they all knew how that felt so they sympathised.

Yes I relate to the spiky empathy profile too. I'm empathetic more times than not, but I'm only human and some situations I can't feel empathy for.

It's like I explained before, about the spelling analogy. I'm very good at spelling but even I come across words that I just cannot spell. Most of the time I can remember how to spell a word new to my vocabulary once I've used it in a written/text sentence, but there are a few spellings that I just can't seem to grasp and I get it wrong each time. But I usually know when a word looks wrong even though I don't know how to spell it.
So it's the same with empathy. I don't generally have low empathy but sometimes I do, occasionally. But when I don't have much empathy for something I'm aware that I'm lacking in empathy.

I think sometimes certain autism, ADHD and mental health traits can appear to look like they're lacking in empathy when they're actually not. For example, with my anxiety disorder I tend to get very sensitive to other people's emotions and tone of voice, and if someone speaks to me in a certain tone I suddenly feel scared and want to cry, not to get sympathy or anything, I literally can't stop the tears. This occurs even if I understand fully how the other person is feeling, but others might think I'm taking it personally but I know that it is not personal but still can't help the tears. So onlookers might think "she's turned on the waterworks to get attention and sympathy, she only thinks of herself", but that is not the case at all.

Then you could argue that most people only see what they can see (from their perspective), instead of considering what could be going on inside (theory of mind). That's why invisible disabilities get overlooked, not just autism but anything that isn't visible. A person with a broken leg might be more able to complete some tasks than a person with autism or even depression, but the person with a broken leg would probably get the most sympathy and top priority for support because their disability (even though it's temporary) can be seen. It's why people with downs syndrome get more sympathy from society, because of their distinct physical features - although I have read that NTs (non-downs people) assume a downs person is "ret*d" and they speak for them even if the downs person is capable of speaking for themselves.

I think with me, it's just my face. It just doesn't show how I'm feeling inside.

But this could be because my mother always became very angry when I showed emotion, either that or she would use it against me, so I learned to never show emotion because it was just safer.

Unfortunately, two different terms are both labeled under "empathy". One is immediately feeling the emotions of another person by virtue of being a person, while the other is feeling emotions of another person by understanding that person's condition and its similarity to your own. Autists are weak in the former, I'd argue strong in the latter. We understand people suffer, but principles and pragmaticism come before emotional impulses.

I was reading about another type recently. It's called Instrumental Empathy.
It's the type that sociopaths use to manipulate people, by honing in on what will hurt them the most.
It's like a really strong cognitive empathy (reading people), with no affective empathy (caring).

https://exploringyourmind.com/instrumen ... ipulation/




From Instrumental Empathy: The Basis of Psychological Manipulation, Exploring Your Mind dot com

That's what I was getting at earlier when discussing how an effective bully would use their empathy to choose especially hurtful actions towards their victim, rather than just being randomly antagonistic.

Right. I noticed a few descriptions of the behaviour but didn't realise it had a label.

This is the type of empathy I would rather have.
In fact, this is the type of empathy needed to excel playing the stupid games.

Than dealing with more emotional dysregulation via emotional contagion and reactivity through unwanted learned responses that was taught to be "appropriate" or worse, "virtuous".


And yes.
I currently fall under the category of 'I feel their pain but they don't need help'. Things that are worse than the so-called "lack of empathy".

It's what I get from people glorifying neurotypicality.

It's also what I get for not being constantly reliable -- who needs help from someone who is not constantly reliable?
And the people around me for most of my life -- "only you can help yourself" to the heart.

However, this doesn't stop me from being autistic;
At least a part of me that feels fricking awkward because of not really knowing when and when it's not really my business to be nosy.

For the same reason as being too trusting, ended up being too cynical -- solely by not knowing when and when not to trust someone...

It's a handy label to have.

It wouldn't surprise me if more people have instrumental empathy, but are only callous without being vindictive or manipulative - essentially choosing to not exploit that trait due to asocial tendencies. It also wouldn't surprise me if there's people who are highly self-centred and exploit that trait to further themselves socially rather than for more cruel/antagonistic purposes.

A tendency towards instrumental empathy might be the result of trauma, or it might just be the result of high cognitive empathy combined with callousness.

Not that you're implying it, but sociopaths would only be one category of people where this is seen.

Good point. I'm sure people can't help which skills they're born with and if they notice they have a talent in one of the areas they'll use it to their best advantage whatever that is, even if it's just for spotting red flags or advancing their career.

Expanding on that post (but no longer a reply, just a tangent):

I think there's sometimes a tendency to forget that people who possess one or two of the dark triad traits without possessing all three, but also that all three of those traits can be further broken down. Awhile back when I did a test it defined:

Machiavellianism seems to have a how much does one believe the world operates that way vs. a how much does one seek to operate that way themselves divide.

Awhile back the different forms of narcissism were discussed on here.

Obviously different people who rank high on dark triad traits might have very different profiles because of how many sub-traits there are to consider. Even more so, people who rank high in one or two of those traits will have profiles that differ even more. In a lot of cases the sorts of people you might never think of as high on all three actually are.

For example, we've had a number of posters over the years who were constantly complaining about every trivial slight they've ever experienced as being an example of being purposefully bullied.

Those same guys often complained about how people more socially skilled than themselves were constantly denying them what was rightfully theirs because everyone is more machiavellian than they are (according to them).

I'd say that nails 2 out of 3 traits (covert narcissism and machiavellianism), but often their demonstrated antisocial tendencies don't amount to more than a lack of empathy for others and a refusal to engage in significant pro-social behaviour. They're not prone to breaking rules (at least the ones they understand) and they're not generally tolerant of people they perceive as openly antisocial.

But wait, that lack of empathy for others (if high enough) and that refusal to engage in pro-social behaviour covers both primary and secondary psychopathy, based on how that test defines it.

So maybe those sorts of whiny, woe is me, wouldn't hurt a fly sortsa guys should be recognized as a form of sociopath possessing the dark triad, or at least adjacent.

Last edited by funeralxempire on 09 May 2023, 11:28 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Exactly, you're born with a talent set and you develop skills as a result of those talents and how they're cultivated.

If you're subjected to trauma in one way or another, you'll develop a skill set to protect yourself from being hurt again.

That skill set might not entirely be pro-social though, because protecting one's self can end up a higher priority.

I'm thinking of spies, moles, foreign diplomats, politicians, dentists, psychics, etc., as well as your run-of-the-mill narcissists and assorted aholes.

I wouldn't assume all of them possess the dark triad, even if some most certainly do.

Cops are prone to possessing all three of those traits.

But I wouldn't assume they all do, but also, that the people who do possess all three; those who's antisocial traits include being unable to respect authority, protocol or rules tend to wash out, meaning a more specific dark triad profile among cops would exist compared to the generic dark triad profile.

^ God that's awkwardly worded.

My awkward brain understood. ^

I do not have a very good relationship with cops.
In my trauma situation they said I was overreacting (lying) or underreacting (lying) no matter what I reported.
Crying or meltdowns were overreacting.
Flat affect and detailed notes were calculated underreacting.
It's like they'd never met an autistic person before.
I wouldn't be surprised if they did believe me but didn't give a flying f.
It wasn't until two NTs reported for me that they took it seriously and pressed charges.