In your opinion, what is the difference between

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an aspie having social anxiety compared to a NT having social anxiety



the way aspies think is the same, this i can only guess.

and it is most likely different from the way NTs think.

but both NTs and aspies can develop social anxiety, depression etc.

so, do NTs and the aspies suffer differently/the same, what do you think?

Last edited by limau on 29 Oct 2011, 2:38 am, edited 1 time in total.

I think an aspie would have social anxiety due to their past experience and poor social skills. They may worry about saying the wrong things or doing a social blunder, they may be scared of getting rejected and singled out and judged or getting meanness.


I think with an NT, it be the opposite because social anxiety came first while with us, AS came first and then it led to social anxiety.

I am an Aspie with Social Phobia, and I know for sure that I have Social Phobia because I've read up on Social Phobia and each point describes me perfectly, without missing one out. Here's the link. http://www.socialphobia.org/whatis.html

I think my AS has triggered off these socially phobic feelings, causing endless irrational thoughts all the time. I have low self-esteem aswell, and I do put myself down an awful lot because of bad experiences by other people in the past. I find it hard to be thick-skinned, because I was born a sensitive person and I will die a sensitive person, so I believe that everybody else is right and I am wrong.

But anyway, I know I do have Social Phobia. I have learnt on WP that NTs notice any teeny bit of body language quicker than a flash of lightening, and can judge you for it, and that has scared me to death of meeting new people, because I just know I will make a fool of myself straight away before I even get to know them. I've also learnt about the blank face thing and the that's-why-people-stare-at-you thing, which has also scared me to death of going out and socialising when asked (it is what I want to do but I don't want to go out and show my face because I know people will pick up on the vibes and will take the mickey.)

All of the above causes Social Phobia. And I get criticised for it by my brother and by other people outside of family. It does make me feel like I am alienating myself, but I think I'd prefer to do that than to show my unconfident face and get people taking the mickey out of me.

Here's a quote from the link what describes me the most:-

I am NOT exaggerating - this is exactly me, 100 percent. Have they observed my behaviour and thoughts and printed me on the internet, just changing the personal description into a young man?

I can see what you mean League_Girl, if one who has AS is naturally extroverted and a combined lack of social skills creates negative experiences. I also think it is possible that someone with AS could be naturally introverted and does not learn social skills by observation so the problem could arise from really not knowing how to be social. I am not diagnosed but as early as I can remember I wondered 'how do people do that' ?

I have been diagnosed with social anxiety some years ago. I think there is no way to tell the difference between an NT or AS with social anxiety. I think for me the anxiety became worse and more obvious because of more painful experiences and growing awareness of my limitations. Sometimes I think being less aware would be better.

I wouldn't really say that I have social anxiety, I just don't get on with most NT's, they don't understand me and I don't understand them. I think that the difference lies in what causes the social anxiety. With Aspies, they are fundamentally different from others, meaning that others will misunderstand the things that they say and do. And so Aspies find themselves getting into trouble and being persecuted for this reason. So "social anxiety" here is your instincts working as they should by spotting a potentially dangerous situation before it unfolds.

But with an NT, their social anxiety might stem from something like a bad childhood experience or past trauma. It may appear to be the same, but it stems from a totally different cause. I have been able to spot the difference between a socially-awkward NT, and an Aspie in the past.

Joe 90 Wrote:

Now I have reacted to my Aspergers in the totally opposite way, I've always rebelled against everyone and have been convinced that everyone else is always wrong and I am always right. I have had a low opinion of the world around me and a high opinion of myself. I was a very sensitive person at one point, but then I came to the conclusion that everyone around me was so full of bs that I stopped caring about their opinions. To me, everyone else's thoughts are irrational and mine are rational. We seem to have dealt with the same problem in the complete opposite way.

I am an Aspie, and I wasn't born with social phobia. I was always a quiet kid, but I wasn't afraid of people in the same sense as someone with social phobia. I think it started in my late childhood, and got worse when I was a teenager. I was always awkward, but as a young kid, I didn't know that. I was actually quite confident in myself when I was young. But as I got older, my awkwardness wasn't dismissed as "cute" anymore, but rather as weird. The constant rejection and teasing is what caused me to be afraid.

The main difference is that NTs innately know how to socialize, there just paralyzed at the fear of socializing. For many aspies, the aspergers is what triggered the social anxiety. I read in a book that social anxiety is when your fear of socializing is unreasonable. Aspies who have a fear of socializing, its reasonable to an extent because we've had so many social blunders we often become very afraid. When it becomes excessive and unreasonable is when it becomes social anxiety.

I've always had social anxiety since I was 8 yrs old. For some reason when I was young, I always wanted to do the correct thing and never ruffle anyone's feathers. Once I stopped knowing how to socialize, my social anxiety led to selective mutism. Aspergers wise, the social demands outweighed the social capacity, I switched to an all-girls school briefly and well girls are more socially sophisticated at a younger age so it led to a downward spiral.

When I was a kid, I would only do things when people approved. Unfortunetly as you grow older, people arent always gonna give you precise instructions on how to go through life. Even when I broke the selective mutism, I was never sure if I was doing the right thing and the nature of my social anxiety changed. I didn't have anyone walking me through the social scene so it was pretty bad cause I was awkward, stiff, fearful, constantly watching people and mystified by how people were naturally interacting. I recall my friend telling me to sit down at a table with some people while she went to get food. I didn't know the people, I was afraid so a froze up. Fast-forward 5 years later to now, I can only do that now because I've grown so much but it would still be a little scary.

Enough about my childhood. See I have a NT friend who had social anxiety. The difference is that she knows how to socialize, she still fears many things but once she found a group of friends who are accepting, she was able to relax and express herself. I think the difference is that once NTs get settled into a comfort zone, they can thrive just like everyone else. Aspies have like a 10x harder time finding a comfort zone. And as an aspie with SA, we cant just find a group of people and settle comfortably in it. Perhaps 1 or 2 people like us but we have a hard time cliquing with everyone else.

Being less aware would be better. I have an Autistic friend who isn't really aware of his limitations, and he actually has more friends than I do. But me, being too aware causes more anxiety, and I tend to avoid social situations because I worry too much of what others might think of me and if they know my limitations. Sometimes I'd rather either be severely ret*d, or just an average NT. By being severely ret*d, you have no idea of what others think of you and you don't think of ways you can change because your brain isn't wired that way and never will be. With being NT, you can select if you want to be different or not, because if you really don't want to be different then it's easy to give off the right impressions that blend in (unless you have barriers of some sort, but I'm just talking about the average NT here). But I feel that I am half Aspie and half NT, and it's always rebelling all the time. I feel like there are two ''earth plates'' inside me, one is NT and one is Aspie, and the NT one is always trying to push it's way up and the Aspie one is always trying to push it's way down, and so is pulling the NT plate down and the NT is pulling the Aspie plate up, and a few times a day or more the Aspie one shoots up, causing a tidal wave of Aspie-ness onto the surface (what makes me miserable), and a few times a day the NT one might pop up and give off a happy tidal wave of NT-ism, which causes proud feelings about myself (this doesn't happen too often because the Aspie-ness only shows up again). But it's like I'm trying my hardest to be like everyone else, and I sort of am, but the Aspie side of me is not letting it be.

i guess being an aspie way of thinking makes us more prone to developing social phobia/anxiety disorders.

of course a NT knows how to socialise, but what about the anxiety experienced is it the same for both groups?

This again nobody knows how an aspie experiences anxiety compared to NT.
However just based on words, a website dedicated to the general population identifies with an aspie too. The concerns are the same... the thoughts are the same. Maybe the thoughts/fears are the same... but the wiring to be able to perform socially successfully, is given to the nt? So maybe the nt, should not worry too much that he cannot perform, because intrinsically he can and he would be understood.

i believe, for one group they're accepted despite the anxiety experienced because they in fact appear more concerned for others existence.
for the other group it is still stuck in anxiety mode plus the failure of social functions (which may translate into different anxious thoughts than those experienced by NT.)

limau and others, I'm a bit surprised how a lot of you think NT's "innately" know how to socialise. I'm NT and I can tell you this is not the case. It is learned behaviour, and if the family in which you grow up is isolated for one reason or another, and you are an only child and other factors come together the opportunities to learn how to make friends and just how to be with people are pretty minimal. That is roughly how my childhood went, so I have social anxiety though not phobia.

I am fortunate to have a small number of really good friends which I somehow made at secondary school and one or two more at Uni. That's pretty much it. I hate parties even if I know some of the people there. I hate meetings with people I don't know even more. It is true I know how to make small talk and I can force myself to walk up to people and try and get into a conversation with them but it takes a huge amount of effort and energy. I feel completely drained afterwards, even after a family get together.

I work best in groups of two, ie with one other person that I can give my full attention to. Unfortunately that can come across as a bit intense.

No one can feel another person's emotions so it's hard to know if social anxiety feels the same for Aspies as for NTs. I strongly suspect it does feel the same. I guess Aspies have a harder time to counteract the resulting isolation. That's perhaps where the true difference lies.

You might find that most people on WP seem to think that an NT life is full of socialising 24/7, without no other care in the world and no interests and hobbys, etc. Well I look at it the same way as you. NTs may have a better social knack than I ever will, but not all NTs desire to spend their whole spare time socialising in hoards of groups forever. I think you're right when you said about NTs innately know how to socialise. There is more to life than just socialising, same as I should start realising that there's more to life than my obsessions.

I don't really buy the notion that there is a specific way of socializing, and that you either "get it" or don't. I have met other Aspies who thought they had terrible "social skills," and got on quite well with them. Their terrible social skills suddenly became quite good social skills when I started talking to them. Funny that.

Thanks for your enlightening answer.. from an NT perspective. I can indentify with/ understand what you write. So NTs also have to learn social skills. The difference lies in the way aspie/nt learn it.

NTs learn social skills by being around other kids growing up (that's what preschool is mostly for) and being around other people and watching them. With autistic people, they don't really learn and it doesn't occur to them and they don't pick up on the rules due to the way their minds are wired so for them to learn them, they need a teacher to teach it to them. Without that, they learn eventually but they are just slower at it. I also wonder if it's possible they can watch other kids and copy them but they may figure out the rules wrong and take things so literal what they see and think they are supposed to act that way and they don't seem to learn on their own that they aren't supposed to act that way and only little kids do it. That was the case with me growing up. I had no concept of rules for different age groups so it was very confusing for me growing up and I noticed at age seven there were rules for different age groups because of what my mother would tell me and I learned what isn't okay for me to do is okay for a three year old to do it. I remember making a thread about it once and I mentioned in it that every time you have a birthday, your parents don't tell you the new rules because kids just figure it out on their own. I think they just outgrow the behaviors and I just took it all literal and keep on doing it.

Plus even children shows teach Social skills. I remember Temple Grandin saying in one of her books ("The Hidden Rules in Relationships" I think it's called.) That was how she learned some growing up.