Is this so wrong?

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I have worked in a number of different jobs. When I am at work, I enjoy focusing on my duties/ projects. I am very focused and goal oriented. I figure that my employers didn't hire me to chit-chat and waste time with my fellow workers. So I do my work; and I do it well. It doesn't feel necessary to me to greet all the other employees and pat them on the back and give them ego strokes. I don't see the point.

I do care about my fello human beings. If a fellow employee has a true problem, I would want to help. But, is it wrong with being un-interested in the every detail of their lives?
Is so wrong to just do my job during the day and leave without at 5pm without gab-sessions with the others at work?

It makes it harder because I am female, and females in this culture are supposed to be socially adept and gregarious.

Yeah, I have that problem too.

Unfortunately, people take it as a sign that you don't like the people that you work with, without knowing that the reason is AS.

No I don't find that wrong.

I have this problem too, and I've ended up getting a lot of hostility from my co-workers for it. I don't see what's wrong with a live-and-let-live attitude and why they take it as a reason to attack me, but their reaction is turning me into the bitter, misanthropic person they probably already thought I was.
I think you're absolutely right about the expectations for females, too.

There's a lot of pressure on the men too, and it's a very manly pressure to be part of the pack, so it's not easier for them. What's easier for AS males is that many (where I work) are the Engineer type.

I'm lucky in that I smoke, so I get seen "socializing", while I get to have to socialize with a reduced group of 1 or 2 people at the same time (the other smokers). I've made my best, and maybe only, connections at work in the smokers' terrace.

That said, I'm earning quite less than I could because I choose to remain at a company that gives lower wages but the people are not a nighmare for me as an aspie, unlike everywhere else I've worked. Even so, I'm considered "weird" and quite left aside, which makes my bosses think twice every few months about keeping me on. They see how amazingly hard I try to fit in, even if I'm not so successful, so they're very slow to fire me (I usually last a couple years).

I too do that I get in fix the problem and get out and do not like to make idle chit chat.

I've been in the same boat. Especially when coworkers start talking about their children. Most every other topic I can kind of fake an interest in or have something relevant to say. But I don't have kids, and won't ever have kids. I biologically can't have kids, so the topic is sometimes a little awkward or painful anyway. But the most relevant input I have is based on my childhood. Comparing your own childhood to a coworker's child's is apparently very odd.

I much prefer it when they say "How are you" and walk off without the answer. Or even better, just "Hi" or a nod.

I'm the exact same way! If they want to talk about subjects not related to work, they need to do so off "company time." It's amazing, the amount of productivity that's lost due to employees being on social networking sites, humor pages and just chattering.

ditto, word by word!!

Same for me, it's just how I am.
I just stay pleasant to interact with and respond pleasantly if anyone wants to talk with me, and then quickly change the subject to something work related I actually want to know and think the other person may also have an interest in or know about

I have always acted that way. When I am at my job, I am there TO WORK. Not to socialize. But people start asking "Why don't you like me??!" & I get flabbergasted. I do not hate them or anything, but I enjoy focusing on details. I will talk to people, but sometimes it makes me forget some detail..

Sincerely,
Matthew

I don't see anything wrong with that.

NTs feel closer to each other after they've smalltalked to each other a lot. It makes the work cooperation flow a lot better. That's why bosses don't like you even if you're the best employee, if they don't see you smalltalk with colleagues.

I see no problem with that, but i did get a bad performance review for that saying "his nose to the grindstone attitude makes for a bad team player."

People in work have been telling me these little stories about the things that their kids have been doing at home. Now I don't care, at all, about what their kids have been up to, and really I'd rather that they didn't tell me about them, but, they are nice people to work with and they don't know that I have a different way of thinking from the norm, so I try to play along.

Sometimes I'm not sure if I'm pulling the "act" off or not, because I don't really know how to respond to these kind of things. I sometimes see onlookers to these situations looking at me with a quizzical expression on their face, as if they're thinking "he is a funny one".

It's very difficult sometimes.

Allowing employees to do these things makes them more productive.

Using the internet:

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505143_162- ... b-at-work/
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505143_162- ... bnetdomain

Socializing:

http://strategicdiscipline.positionings ... oductivity
http://businessjournal.gallup.com/conte ... ctive.aspx

The assumption that if they couldn't do these things they would be working harder is false. Human beings aren't machines, after all. I guess you are literally correct, in that the fact that no productivity is lost and some gained would amaze some people.

This probably works differently for autistic people. I think that autistic people likely still need downtime. At least, I do when doing some kinds of work, but other kinds I work best if I don't get interrupted at all.