Welcome back to Reading the Research, where I trawl
the Internet to find noteworthy research on autism and related subjects,
then discuss it in brief with bits from my own life, research, and
observations.
Today's article covers the beneficial effects of living in a foreign country. What does this have to do with autism? Well, one of the alternative names for autism is "Wrong Planet Syndrome." This is based on a half-joke, half astute observation that autistic people act and speak like foreigners to our home countries. The joke is that we must, therefore, be aliens on the wrong planet. I believe this phrase was coined by humorous autistic people, and wrongplanet.net was formed as one of the earliest gatherings of autistic people online.
The article says that people who live for a long time abroad tend to engage in more self-reflection and reflection about life and cultures in general. This is good, because I've noticed a lot of neurotypical people seem to live unexamined lives. On my more crabby days, I sometimes say that NT people float through life, whereas I have to crawl.
As a child, I spent a lot of time doing hard thinking about who I was and why the world is the way it is. I still do this now, though not as often as I have less free time to commit. I found it a highly valuable activity: by taking the time to figure out why these things existed, I gained a lot of valuable information. For example: driving laws exist to standardize the experience of driving. While other people can never totally be made predictable, by setting specific rules for how to handle situations, you make the flow of traffic more efficient.
Small talk is another one, but its function is less obvious. Autistic people naturally lean toward wanting to be good at things, and tend to be very logical and literal-minded. Therefore, talking about the weather, which is boring to most people, seems extremely pointless. Why would you not spend the time talking about interesting animals, or laws that need changing, or even philosophy? At least that would be novel, rather than saying for the 1438th time, "Gee whiz, it sure is raining out there." Or talking about a sports team, when many autistic people could not care less.
But sadly the point of small talk is not information or idea exchange: it's to convey emotional connectedness and similarity. The words you specifically say aren't as important as the meaning you're conveying behind them, which is, roughly, "I too experience this life in a similar way to you, and we have this thing in common." For neurotypicals, this connectedness drive is more important in most cases than the drive to be good at things. In autistic people, it's usually the other way around.
Without spending time doing self-reflection, I would never have realized these things, so when the article talked about people having clearer self-images and understandings of their personal values, I thought of myself, and then of many other autistic people I've met. We have particular ways of doing things, and we like to stick to them. We often have strong personal values and are influenced less by our respective cultures.
So I wondered, then, whether some of these effects of living abroad might explain part of why autistic people are the way we are... While I was thinking about it, I remembered that I've read, multiple times in books, that it's often easier for autistic people to fit into other cultures. Our lack of understanding of social norms and various personal oddities, in other cultures, are passed off as the mistakes of a foreigner, rather than the mistakes of a person with disabilities. This is immensely freeing and helpful, as in our home cultures we are always penalized for being what we are. Daniel Tammet, author of Born on a Blue Day, described such freeing experiences in his book. He, a citizen of England, went to Lithuania for volunteer work. He proceeded to learn the local language, make friends, and in general have a very life-enriching time.
In general, then, I rather wonder whether it wouldn't be a valuable experience for better blended, and more independent autistic people to visit other countries. Or, I guess, given the benefits outlined here, pretty much any person.
Today's article covers the beneficial effects of living in a foreign country. What does this have to do with autism? Well, one of the alternative names for autism is "Wrong Planet Syndrome." This is based on a half-joke, half astute observation that autistic people act and speak like foreigners to our home countries. The joke is that we must, therefore, be aliens on the wrong planet. I believe this phrase was coined by humorous autistic people, and wrongplanet.net was formed as one of the earliest gatherings of autistic people online.
The article says that people who live for a long time abroad tend to engage in more self-reflection and reflection about life and cultures in general. This is good, because I've noticed a lot of neurotypical people seem to live unexamined lives. On my more crabby days, I sometimes say that NT people float through life, whereas I have to crawl.
As a child, I spent a lot of time doing hard thinking about who I was and why the world is the way it is. I still do this now, though not as often as I have less free time to commit. I found it a highly valuable activity: by taking the time to figure out why these things existed, I gained a lot of valuable information. For example: driving laws exist to standardize the experience of driving. While other people can never totally be made predictable, by setting specific rules for how to handle situations, you make the flow of traffic more efficient.
Small talk is another one, but its function is less obvious. Autistic people naturally lean toward wanting to be good at things, and tend to be very logical and literal-minded. Therefore, talking about the weather, which is boring to most people, seems extremely pointless. Why would you not spend the time talking about interesting animals, or laws that need changing, or even philosophy? At least that would be novel, rather than saying for the 1438th time, "Gee whiz, it sure is raining out there." Or talking about a sports team, when many autistic people could not care less.
But sadly the point of small talk is not information or idea exchange: it's to convey emotional connectedness and similarity. The words you specifically say aren't as important as the meaning you're conveying behind them, which is, roughly, "I too experience this life in a similar way to you, and we have this thing in common." For neurotypicals, this connectedness drive is more important in most cases than the drive to be good at things. In autistic people, it's usually the other way around.
Without spending time doing self-reflection, I would never have realized these things, so when the article talked about people having clearer self-images and understandings of their personal values, I thought of myself, and then of many other autistic people I've met. We have particular ways of doing things, and we like to stick to them. We often have strong personal values and are influenced less by our respective cultures.
So I wondered, then, whether some of these effects of living abroad might explain part of why autistic people are the way we are... While I was thinking about it, I remembered that I've read, multiple times in books, that it's often easier for autistic people to fit into other cultures. Our lack of understanding of social norms and various personal oddities, in other cultures, are passed off as the mistakes of a foreigner, rather than the mistakes of a person with disabilities. This is immensely freeing and helpful, as in our home cultures we are always penalized for being what we are. Daniel Tammet, author of Born on a Blue Day, described such freeing experiences in his book. He, a citizen of England, went to Lithuania for volunteer work. He proceeded to learn the local language, make friends, and in general have a very life-enriching time.
In general, then, I rather wonder whether it wouldn't be a valuable experience for better blended, and more independent autistic people to visit other countries. Or, I guess, given the benefits outlined here, pretty much any person.
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