When NT's think you are overanalyzing social situations.

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When I discuss my social difficulties to nuerotypicals and I explain to them my situations and all the details in it, they would say something along the lines of "you're over thinking it", "you're over analyzing it", "it will all naturally come to you", or "go with the flow".

The problem is, advice like that is INTENDED to calm the other person down, but instead it only confuses or angers them more because there are many factors in a social situation and they do not know EXACTLY what they are doing wrong.

Nuerotypicals take for granted the social abilities they have they we lack. They can easily and quickly understand body language and indirect communication. They aren't as clumsy or gauche. Even the nuerotypicals which have social difficulty.

So if they are in a social situation, it may be obvious for them. Or it may be so natural that they don't have to think about it. But for Aspies such as myself, it is a different case. For example, where should I sit (who should I sit next to)? A nuerotypical could instantly at the moment pick the right spot without thinking about it. Whereas, there are social consquences even for screwing up a minor mistake like that.

Not that they are close-minded or bad people, but they just don't know what its like to be an Aspie.

Your thoughts?

They don't understand.

You haven't a clue what is going on in a social situation. Not sure if it's like my cases but often times I am not clued in nor do hints or clues come to me on time or naturally.

They were raised to follow social protocols that alot of people were also raised to follow yet are really flawed.

This natural ability to pick out certain mannerisms and clues is taught but using that standard script NT's were taught to believe is the bible of social cues falls flat when coming across very charming manipulative liars. Their instinct may tell them avoid this person but they have to choose. Do they look at the person's social cues or do they trust their gut instinct? Alot of times they follow the social lessons instead and end up being misled.

In a sense, alot of people follow scripts and if you don't follow that script then there is an impression that there is something BAD about you meanwhile they totally disregard the fact that those who follow that script so well and can even fool lie detectors are the ones they need to be careful of.

Showing the fallacies of these social cue scripts is like bashing religion to a religious person.

It's something that was taught at such an early age that you would be forcing them to re-think about what was taught at such an impressionable age that it mostly makes the person wish to avoid you rather than question what they were taught.

Go with the flow for NT's is easier than for autistics mostly because they have more friends. Their circle of friends also get to know the same group of friends. If one person isn't as open to one person but is more open to another person then the person who got more information about the person will inform their group of friends about such information keeping the friends up to date while leaving anyone out of their circle in the dark.

We're basically left out of social situations causing us to over-think about intentions, motivations what is really going on. NT's also assume alot if they do not get enough information. There is no several outcomes or several causes for how someone is responding but they come up with one conclusion and stick with it.

If it turns out their conclusion was false then they'll defend their assumption anyway and can become nasty to a person if it was a negative conclusion for as long as they live even getting their friends to agree with that assumption not admitting to being wrong.

I get this kind of comment a lot. And I used to hate it - perhaps because at the time I was not aware of my ASD. Now I know the reason for my overthinking/overanalysing ... it's still frustrating.

But just recently, I had an experience which has triggered me to just "be natural" from now on. To go with what is natural for me.

And suddenly these comments don't bother me quite as much. I think of them as a reminder to just be myself, be natural. People will either accept me as I am, with the way I act, or they won't. And I can't change that - even by overthinking, overanalysing and then trying to act in the appropriate or "normal" way... I've been doing that for 38 years with no success.

It's much less stressful to just be myself. It doesn't stop the overanalysing of situations (especially after the fact) because I want to understand them, and that overthinking side of me is part of me being natural. But it all just feels more "comfortable".

I understand where you are coming from - I have some traits of autism (I don't know if I would be formally diagnosed if I were to be assessed by a professional). It took me a long time to learn the social skills that I have - it was not a matter of "going with the flow"! !! I have lots of rules that I follow and even some rules for when I don't know what to do or make of a situation.

I can liken it to having my friend show me how to wiggle my ears (I can't - my nerves are not wired that way). She can just wiggle her ears. She can tell me to relax, she can tell me to concentrate, she can tell me whatever she wants - I can't wiggle my ears. Fortunately, one does not need to wiggle one's ears to get by in life.

As with social skills, just keep doing what most Aspie people do - follow general guidelines ("rules" if you will) and get by the best way you can. NT find it as easy my friend wiggling her ears. That's good for them. You just keep doing what you need to do when you don't have the natural capacity. If I wanted to move my ears - I have learned to turn my whole head

"No it doesn't come naturally to me and I can't find any flow to go with. That's a big part OF the social side of AS."

You can always respond back with "you're not thinking enough." See, put them on the spot, eh, eh? I actually literally tend to do that, bring to light "normal" people's lack of thought process to them.

On a serious note, if you don't wanna tell them you got Aspergers and do a big long spiel and whatever, just be like "yeah I can't do that, my brain works differently than your's and has to think about stuff more than your's."

That's exactly the problem. The result is always negative when I do what comes naturally, or try to "go with the flow."

It is the very nature of Asperger's that it's sufferers must think about and analyze the tiniest minutaie of every social interaction. If social interaction came naturally to us, we would not have Asperger's.

Sometimes they're right.

There's been many times when I realized I was overanalyzing or overdoing something social.

One thing I've found is very useful is to think of social situations in sensory terms, think about what sensory information(i.e. what people do you need to look at, what aspects of those people are actually important, what should be listened to,...) would help you understand the social situation the most and then direct your focus accordingly. By doing that you help consciously replicate the same process that is going on unconsciously in NTs.

Thinking about where energy is inside your own body and learning how to move and manage it according to your needs is also a good strategy and will help make sure you have enough energy(and in the right places) at your disposal when you need it so you don't have to strain yourself so much to do things.

Practicing with moving energy around can help make it easier and faster to direct energy where it needs to go.

hi there,

i wonder how all those NTs know about all this stuff... do they also learn smalltalk, or is it fixed encoded from birth in their brain?

thank,
anton

I actually enjoy all of the in-depth discussion on social situations. It is one of many things that make WP an enjoyable forum.
Unfortunately we live in a world where people insist on communicating indirectly and vaguely. Instead of a simple "you should do this" advice you are unhelpfully dismissed. Hopefully you can get the exact answers you are looking for in whatever social situation you find yourself in.
Asking someone where you should sit is not an unreasonable question and should be answered respectfully and not dismissed.

On a more serious note you a somewhat correct people don't think enough. The lack of introspection some people show is downright astounding! Doesn't everyone always question the world around them--apparently not.

NTs will never understand this in the same way we'll never understand some of the things they do. We overanalyze because we're compensating for a lack of natural understanding. As others have said, it will never "just come to us" even if we sat there for a hundred years, and we can't "go with the flow" because we can't tell which way that is and didn't know there was a "flow" to begin with.

NTs dont think less, but it depends on how much fantasy they use to fill the slots instead of seeing facts.