The third person usage....

Post Reply New Topic

I was talking with a psychiatrist young lady the other day and she told me that almost all autistics she inspected refer to themselves in the third person. ie. LePetitPrince talking: "LePetitPrince is hungry , LePetitPrince wants to eat the cake, **gulp** oops LePetitPrince ate the stripper in the cake , stupid LePetitPrince ."

I don't recall that I ever referred to myself in the third party, and 99% of users don't use the third person to refer themselves.

How come...?

No. Of course not. "Most"? I haven't met that many ASD people who do this. My son still says his name a lot but he is severely language-delayed and is operating on approx. a 28-month age level verbally (he is six years old)...using the third person at that stage or perhaps a bit earlier is actually a normal part of development.

I know a good few grown-up autists and have never heard them calling themselves in the third person. I'm sure it must happen but "most"? Nah.

Not in speech, but inside my head I have a sort of "narration" of stuff that's happening, which is sometimes in first and sometimes third person.

Never done while speaking, recently (weeks) I've found myself thinking of me as if I were an outside observer and this has worried me a bit.

That makes no sense. Referencing oneself in the third person seems more like a cognitive issue to me. The autistic people she inspected probably had some form of mental retardation, or at least a disability in understanding language.

I always picture myself from the first person perspective, never third person. Sometimes when I refer to the number of people in a group I'll forget to include myself. I thought inability to see yourself as other's see you was an aspie trait, i.e. not being able to imagine things from a third person perspective.

There is someone on the forums that refers to themselves in 3rd person.

My little sister who is speech delayed also does this.

Sometimes when talking to my father for instance I'll say Daddy hates ___ instead of "you" a lot but they are the only people I call by their names.

I usually don't refer to myself in 3rd person except lately I now call myself the mom or the mommy to my kids (ages 1 and 2).

Once years ago before I had kids I was in basic training for the Air Force, and in the dining facility (chow hall), they had what they called the "snake pit" where a bunch of TI's (drill sgts) sit, eat and randomly pull "trainees" aside to haze a bit (but it's not hazing because that's illegal). So, once I got called a couple weeks before graduation, and I didn't have a piece of paper I was supposed to have on me at all times. And in the midst of being nervous about what happens if you don't have that piece of paper and in fear that these guys were going to seriously make it into a big deal (as they did verbally at that time, but not like got me trouble), I answered one of their questions in 3rd person. Then this one asked if there were two of me and made a big deal about it. Every time he saw me after that, he kept asking me how the two of us were doing. So then graduation comes around and my mom comes in town to watch it, and I get my first free hours away from it all to go wherever I wanted to go. So my mom and I went to a restaurant along the riverwalk, and I hadn't had real food with more than 2 minutes to eat for a very long time, so I ordered and ate a lot. The last time through the dining facility, I ran into that one TI again and he asked what I did and where I went with my mom. I told him. Then he asked if I ordered extra food for my other self, and I told him actually, I kinda did since I had 3 appetizers, 2 entrees, and 2 desserts.

I read a book, Marcelo in the Real World, in which the main character (Marcelo) occasionally refers to himself and others in the third person. Marcelo has Asperger's Syndrome. I didn't pay close enough attention to the situations in which he used the third person though, to see if anything triggered it.

I have AS, but I don't recall ever talking in the third person, unless I'm joking around or feigning superiority. It's interesting, because in Japan it's not uncommon for people to talk in the third person so as to avoid being overly direct.

I don't refer to myself in the 3rd person.

am guessing one reason is it comes from pro noun difficulty [difficulty with the self words,and relating them to self],and that as self ages,the possibility that are going to improve is high unless are profoundly affected.
Is the pyschiatrist very..expert[?] on autism and the whole spectrum as a whole? that sounds like a old generalizing stereotype she;s using.


am use third person,though had technically gone onto learn pronouns-had only managed it through memorization,upon seeing them they left am crippled from accute confusion and overload,but one pronoun works,felt solid and was able to relate it to self, health over language any time in own situation,told different by some users who had no idea what it was like.


This is one of those times where pyschs and others should remember just how autism is made up differently in each person,listen to temple grandin- when she said it depends on what connections get made or not made on how someones autism appears, and another which was told a long time ago-was told by own [very experienced] support staff from the national autistic society that she has worked with so many Autistics in residential and day services and never come across two service users alike.
So how is it all of us are expected to show what is a differing difficulty?

Perhaps someone would try to analyze all the posts in WP to see any references in the 3rd person. My guess is that it is a small minority, or none at all.

I don't think I've ever heard or seen that particular habit being attributed to autistics.

My son refers to himself in the third person, but not as himself. He will assume the persona of a gerbil or a baby, for example, and when he's doing that he usually refers to himself as third person.

Now I think of it, when he was younger (he's 7 now) he did refer to himself fairly often in the third person.

I have read that it is a trait associated with autism, but that doesn't mean to say that most, or many, do it. Perhaps it's more common in children in adults.

oh jesus, no. but i WILL say this though: NT's refer to me in third person right in front of me as though i'm not there. that sends me into a silent rage.