Autism and Our Anti-Hierarchical World

One of the main features of autism is the lack of a foreground/periphery differentiation. This is particularly noticeable in hearing, since we can become overwhelmed by background noises which we cannot filter out in order to focus on the foreground. For most people it is an automatic, natural thing to filter out the background and focus on what you want to hear -- typically whoever is talking to you. However, people with autism get everything at once.

However, this is also true with vision. We are easily distracted by things in our peripheral vision, causing us to look around, glance at everything. This is easily taken as attention deficit, but what it is in fact is attention to too many things at once. At its worst, it can be overwhelming. And it's at least annoying to anyone you're speaking to, who is expecting you to look at them the entire time.

What this means is that on the sensory level, people with autism do not differentiate between the center and the periphery, the foreground and the periphery. That is, we quite literally do not create a hierarchy in our hearing or our vision.

This inability to recognize hierarchy extends beyond the sensory. I believe that people with autism are naturally egalitarian in nature precisely because we simply cannot create the hierarchies in the first place. One result of this is a refusal to recognize work hierarchies -- people on the spectrum are infamous for treating their bosses like their coworkers. This makes sense if there is something about the autistic brain that refuses to either create or recognize hierarchy.

If this is true, it makes sense of some comments that were made about some characters I had created for a novel I was writing for a novel writing class. I had a husband and wife in the novel, and people -- both men and women -- complained that they couldn't tell who was "in charge" in the relationship. Consider the fact that this was a graduate level novel writing class, meaning pretty much everyone in there was left of Stalin, and you can see how deeply ingrained the typical person's thinking is in hierarchy. I created a truly equal relationship, and egalitarian leftists objected! My thinking was able to create a truly egalitarian relationship, and nobody liked that fact.

In fact, I can think of any number of times when my refusal to recognize hierarchies of any kind created problems. Yet, at the same time, it means I refuse to treat women as unequal to men in any way, and it means I refuse to differentiate among races, ethnicity, etc. The poor and the wealthy, the weak and the powerful are all the same to me. Perhaps it is because I simply can't differentiate among them.

Of course, this equally suggests that neurotypical people simply cannot help but to differentiate among people, to place people into hierarchies. It is a struggle for neurotypicals to recognize scale free networks, to think of men and women as equal, to not think in racial and ethnic terms, of people as unequal by any number of measures. This explains why they think social orders can be turned into hierarchical organizations, and why they think it's desirable to do so.

Human Universals and Autism

There are many myths out there about people on the autism spectrum. A recent one I experienced involved an argument that because people on the spectrum aren't naturally social, being social isn't a human universal (since "universal" means everyone does it -- more on that, momentarily). One could make the argument that, because people on the spectrum tend to have opposite tendencies to neurptypicals, the existence of autism either proves that human universals are, at best, only quasi-univeral, or people on the spectrum should not be properly considered "human."

The latter option is nauseous, and the former option I reject. And I reject it because the assumption regarding people on the spectrum is wrong. People with autism are not naturally anti-social. Quite the contrary. There is a strong desire to be social -- only, there are extreme difficulties in actually being social, in doing the right things, in communicating (literally, or properly). If the human universal involves wanting to be social to any degree whatsoever, then sociality is a human universal, since people on the spectrum do in fact want to be social to at least some degree.

Another example one could raise is the fact that neurotypical humans tend to engage in top-down thinking. Is this a human universal? Probably. Does the fact that autistics are dominated by bottom-up thinking disprove this universal? Not at all. Neurotypicals can in fact engage in bottom-up thinking, and autistics can in fact engage in top-down thinking. There is a range of which tendency dominates. It is a natural variation, and there is no one who cannot do both, even if one or the other is preferred.

I leave aside the fact that when dealing with complex entities, you have to have a somewhat fuzzier definition of "universal." The fact that there are people who are born without legs does not mean humans are not universally bipedal, and the fact that there are people born without a moral compass (sociopaths) does not mean humans are not universally moral or share a universal moral system. To avoid the problem, one could perhaps argue more for "cultural universals" rather than "human universals," but this really says practically the same things, since humans are always already social. Even sociopaths most of the time pretend to abide by the morals of the society into which they are born. And sometimes pretending is enough.

Indeed, people on the spectrum spend a great deal of time learning how to pretend to act "normal." But this normal is really just part of a spectrum of behaviors and ways of thinking that lie outside the existence of the kinds of universals of which I speak. Indeed, some things -- like rituals -- are even more strongly desired by autistics than neurotypicals. No one would argue that ritual isn't a human universal because neurotypicals are less attracted to them than are autistics.

Executive Functioning, Creativity, and Autism

New research has shown that creativity mostly takes place in the cerebellum, while the executive functioning of the frontal lobe actually restricts creativity.

One of the features of autism (and ADD/ADHD) is impaired executive functioning. Among the things executive functioning does, according to Web MD:

• Manage time
• Pay attention
• Switch focus
• Plan and organize
• Remember details
• Avoid saying or doing the wrong thing
• Do things based on your experience 

When your executive functioning is impaired, you have difficulty with the above abilities. I recently wrote about the problems people with autism have with the last one on the list. The inability to make use of prior knowledge, then, is an executive functioning problem. While this seems to contradict my claims in the previous post, the place where concepts are formed -- the hippocampus -- is also a place where executive functioning takes place. And there are impairments with the hippocampus in those with autism -- in particular, there are issues with oxytocin, about which I have written before.

All of this points to a brain that is structurally and biochemically different from more typical brains. And the connection between executive functioning and creativity also explains why autistic people tend to be very creative.

Problems With Concept Formation May Be Central in Autism

From my reading and my own experiences, I have developed a theory of autism in which concept formation difficulties is central. I have discussed these things in various posts, including here and here and here. Now there is strong evidence for this theory in some recent research.

According to Zaidel, the new study provides support for the idea that people with autism are highly sensitive to incoming sensory information. Moreover, he suggests, they are predisposed toward relying more highly on external stimulation - with less use of prior knowledge - when interpreting the world around them.

"Our results suggest that people with autism may experience a deficiency in what are known in the scientific literature as Bayesian priors - the ability to draw on existing knowledge to understand what we see and to predict what we will see in the near future," Zaidel says. "If you're more heavily weighted toward perceiving the world bottom up - from stimulus to perception - and relying less on rules of thumb from prior knowledge, perception will be both more taxing, and more sensitive to sensory noise."

 In other words, those with autism are taking in information and trying to make sense of that information. If there is a concept available with which to relate the new information, everything is just fine. But if not, it creates confusion and frustration. Imagine being faced with what to you is "new information" all the time. Being presented with new information you don't really know how to integrate can be frustrating -- just ask any student learning new things. Now imagine that your everyday experience is like that.

The farther along the spectrum one is, the more difficult it is to create concepts -- and therefore, the more severe the symptoms. It will be hard to verbalize what you cannot fully conceive. Thus language delays in non-Asperger's autistics. And we must not forget that instincts are concepts with which we are born. Fewer instincts in those with autism would seem to point to a general problem with creating concepts, including those with which we are born.

Vitamin D and Omega-3

Researchers in New Zealand are planning to do research on the role of nutrition in autism -- specifically, they are looking at vitamin D and omega-3 fatty acids. The latter are commonly found in fatty fishes like salmon.

When I took a physical this past summer, the doctor told me to take vitamin D, as I did not have enough. I have to wonder if Daniel may be low as well. One way of getting vitamin D is to spend time outdoors in the sun, as UV B from the sun converts cholesterol into vitamin D. More outdoor play may be recommended. Lack of outdoor play may be a partial causal factor in the increase in autism, if it is proven vitamin D is connected.

It is known that when you are "hungry for" something, that is usually an indication that your body is trying to get something it needs. I have always been hungry for seafood. Daniel loves salmon especially. Could those cravings be connected to a heightened need for omega-3 fatty acids?

Balloonacy -- A Play Good for Children with Autism

Today the family went to the Dallas Children’s Theater to watch Balloonacy, a cute mime play about an old man who lives in an apartment by himself and is celebrating his birthday alone, when a balloon comes in through his open window and becomes his friend. The Dallas Children’s Theater has special showings of certain plays for children with sensory issues, and we have been going since their first such show. The sound is not as loud and the lighting contrast between the stage and the seats is not as sharp.

Although this was not our first play we attended at DCT, and although Balloonacy was not specifically written for children on the autism spectrum – it is a pretty standard mime play in the French style with light slapstick – I decided to write a little about this play because of Daniel’s reaction to the play, and because I think that this play is particularly good for children on the spectrum to see.

The story is about an old man who lives alone and is trying to eat a spaghetti dinner he warmed up in the microwave and to celebrate his birthday. A red balloon flies in through the window, and the old man tries to put it out – only to have the balloon return again and again. Finally, he slams the window shut, smashing his thumb – which causes him to put a band-aid on it. The balloon is magical – appearing out of the trash and out of boxes, including a birthday present left at the front door. The old man grows fond of the balloon when it appears out of the birthday present, and he begins interacting with it and playing with it. At one point he is playing with a fork, and he accidentally stabs the balloon. The balloon starts to lose air, and it slowly deflates. He puts the balloon in a box, puts the band-aid from his thumb onto the balloon, and the balloon reappears fully inflated. After more shenanigans, the old man tries to eat his birthday cupcake, and the balloon smashes it into the old man’s face – as the old man wipes off his face after putting the cupcake down on his seat, he sits on the cupcake. He gets angry at the balloon and throws it out the window, but quickly regrets doing so. He tries to show hearts out the window, then draws a big heart on a piece of newspaper, creates a paper airplane out of it, and flies it out the window. The balloon returns, and the balloon and the old man leave together. The play ends with the old man flying into the distant sky, holding the balloon.

One of the main attributes of autism is high orientation toward objects. Autistics are more comfortable interacting with objects than with people. They even relate, in a certain sense, to objects. I have used this knowledge to help socialize Daniel by making the Matchbox cars he’s obsessed with talk to each other. He’s then been able to transfer the emotions from the cars to people to a certain degree. Lately he’s started to demonstrate interest in getting things for his brother and/or sister when we go to the store, rather than just think about getting a car for himself. But he still prefers objects over people.

Balloonacy has two characters in it. The old man, and the balloon. Daniel identified with the balloon. He is also a fan of slapstick comedy (I have read that this is not uncommon for people on the spectrum), but there is little doubt he identified more with the balloon than the man. He was utterly delighted with the balloon and its antics (all children are, but not in the way Daniel does, identifying with the balloon – most children are delighted with the balloon the way the old man is). But then something interesting happened. The balloon popped. And Daniel began to cry. And the old man got upset. And Daniel began to cry a bit more, wiping tears away. Daniel was sad the balloon popped, and then when the old man was also sad, he saw the man feeling the way he did, and empathized with the old man.

While this may seem a normal thing to do – because, for a neurotypical person, it is – for Daniel this is major. Not only did Daniel feel sad for the balloon, which is something that we might in fact expect from him, but Daniel also felt sad that the old man felt sad. The feelings he had for the balloon was transferred to the old man. It was obvious from his body language and the ways he reacted to first the balloon and then the old man reacting to the balloon. Daniel hugged up on me to get some comfort when the old man was visibly upset, and had merely slumped in his seat when the balloon popped.

It seems to me that Balloonacy is a fantastic play for children on the spectrum precisely because of how Daniel reacted. There was an object the autistic children could relate to, and a person on whom they could transfer their feelings toward the object. This is empathy development, and people on the spectrum need a certain degree of empathy development. This play is a fantastic vehicle for this kind of transference and the redirection of the autistic child toward human emotional responses and interactions.

Employing People on the Spectrum -- Good For Business

Word is starting to get out that it makes good business sense to hire autistic people. Apparently, Microsoft is making a push to hire more people with autism. They have discovered that people with autism have capabilities neurotypicals do not, and that those capabilities are great for the bottom line. Who, after all, doesn't want someone who can find 10% more coding errors than can the average population? (This, by the way, is why I'm a good editor and proofreader.)

It turns out that people with autism seem to have increased perceptual awareness, which makes us appear distracted or not able to pay attention, but which in fact means we are taking in more and more and more information. If this is also what is happening with ADD/ADHD, this would suggest that ADD/ADHD is on one side of Asperger's like autism is on the other side of it. In any case, this would suggest that there is a group of people we have pathologized, but who are simply hyperperceptual. Such people are taking in and processing more information than are neurotypical people. Which would go a long way to explaining why so many people on the spectrum (especially if we expand the spectrum to include ADD/ADHD) are scientists, artists, and creative types.

While processing extra information does cause sensitivities -- to touch, to light, to certain sounds (like the high-pitched screech from my son that overwhelmed me for a few seconds while I was trying to write this) -- and background noises becoming foregrounded, making hearing conversations in a crowded room difficult, it also means strong attention to detail, high degrees of pattern recognition, and a strong ability to differentiate sounds. Different people will have different skills, meaning there will be some better with sounds, others better with language, and others better with math and programming. And there may be combinations. I'm not sure how good I may be with sounds, as I never learned to play an instrument, but I am a poet in no small part because I am obsessed with the sounds of the words -- I love alliteration, and I used it even before I started writing with regular rhythm and end rhyme. I am equally obsessed with patterns -- which is why I study complexity (love of patterns also is important in writing poems and studying literature).

Despite all of these benefits, people on the spectrum are woefully underemployed. I have read that people with Asperger's have about a 20% unemployment rate. The linked article reports that in the U.K., only 15% of people on the spectrum have full time employment. But 60% say they want to work. That's a terrible situation. And it's one I've been familiar with myself. In truth,

employers need to be better educated about the value autistic employees can bring. Businesses need to know about potential difficulties that autistic employees might experience, the simple adjustments that can accommodate them and the wide range of skills and interests that they can bring to the workplace.

One adjustment that needs to be made, as I have pointed out elsewhere, is that employers need to decide whether or not they want good workers or good people with whom to socialize. I would also note that people on the spectrum are probably not going to mention during the interview that they are on the spectrum -- and as a result, give an interview that they will think is fine, but which is, in the view of the interviewer, a disaster with someone whom they would never hire. Who would hire someone who won't look at you and rambles on and on? In my experience, very few.

Polymath or Know-It-All?

It is apparently not uncommon for people with Asperger's to be thought of as "know-it-alls." But what, exactly, is a know-it-all?

I have been called a polymath, a Renaissance man, extremely knowledgeable, and, yes, a know-it-all. What is the difference among these things?

A polymath is someone who knows a great deal about a great many things. I have published on economics, sociology, literature, theater, philosophy, psychology and neuroscience, networks, complexity, organizations, spontaneous orders, and morals. I have a B.A. in recombinant gene technology with a minor in chemistry, and I have two years of grad school in molecular biology; I have a M.A. in English; and I have a Ph.D. in the humanities, the dissertation for which was titled "Evolutionary Aesthetics." I am also the author of Diaphysics, a book that covers all of those topics as well as physics.

A Renaissance man is a polymath who is also an artist. I write plays and poetry.

Obviously, "extremely knowledgeable" is a general term for polymath.

So what about "know-it-all"? It is obviously intended as an insult. In my experience is it wielded by those who have lost the argument to my superior knowledge on a topic or who feel overwhelmed by my unrelenting barrage of facts on the topic at hand. That's when you get slammed with the epithet "know-it-all." Those who are accused of such ought to take comfort. Receiving the accusation is an admission of ignorance and defeat by the person delivering it.

Autism and the Questioning of Cultural Conventions

Cultural conventions border on the arbitrary. They are "real" only in the social sense of reality. They are meaningful only because we give them meaning. But that doesn't mean that they don't evoke real emotional responses from people when they are violated.

One example of a cultural norm in the U.S. is the removal of price tags on gifts. We all know to do this, because we were told by our parents to do that. But why do we take off the tags on gifts? It's a cultural convention. There could be a culture in which one leaves them on in order to make sure people know the value of the gifts. There were plenty of gift cultures in the past which emphasized the size and value of the gifts which could have evolved, in a modern context, to giving gifts with the price tags still on. In each case, people practicing the cultural norm would be offended and appalled at violations such as leaving the price tag on, or taking it off, respectively.

I have always been able to see through cultural norms and conventions such as these. And I suspect this is a general trait of those on the spectrum. It would explain why people with Asperger's marry people from other cultures at a much higher rate than the general population. If cultural norms are merely conventions, they aren't "real" in the physical sense, and therefore one can easily adjust to different norms. If you are on the spectrum, at least.

This ability to see through cultural norms as merely conventional is also one of the things that gets autistics in trouble with neurotypicals, who do not think them conventional, but take them seriously. This would create a great deal of social awkwardness, some interpreted as rudeness, if autistics are constantly ignoring social conventions because, seeing them as merely conventional and arbitrary, they don't think them all that important. They fail to take into consideration the fact that everyone not on the spectrum does take them seriously. Sometimes deadly seriously.

Yet, for there to be cultural change, there have to be people around who question the cultural norms, pointing out that they are in fact social constructs. Thus, people on the spectrum could contribute to cultural evolution; they would keep things changing by always questioning. As such, they are an important part of any society, even if this role is utterly unappreciated and often outright disdained.

April is Autism Month -- On the Gap Between Knowing and Acting

April is Autism Awareness Month.

I recently found a poem I had written in which I discuss my sensory issues. The poem was written well before I learned I have Asperger's. It was untitled, so I gave it the title An Intense World. One of the great things about discovering I am on the spectrum is that it provides an explanation for how I experience the world.

I'll be honest, that experience is frustrating much of the time. There are things I understand on an intellectual level, but which I have exceeding difficulty in realizing. The importance of social networking for any kind of success, for example. The fact of the matter is that anyone who is successful at anything at all tends to be a brilliant social networker -- at least within their area of expertise. It is all about the number and quality of social links.

But this sort of thing is precisely where I fail. Making social connections creates anxiety. And the perception that I'm strange and/or arrogant strains the few social connections I have.

In addition, there is a certain degree of "I want to do only what I want to do" that I find it hard to get out of, even if I know I have to do so to succeed. The ideal situation for me would be to have a lot of time writing -- poems, plays, books, blogs, articles and essays -- and a secretary making sure that everything I was writing was being sent out.

I have 473 poems on my poetry blog, either posted or scheduled to be posted. Shouldn't I have a few chapbooks at the very least? I decided to publish them on my blog because that was the best way for me to get them out there for someone to read. Further, I have numerous plays, but I have only had one performed, while another made it to a stage reading. Given that the one that was performed won first place, I should have had more plays performed by now. Had the theater in which I managed to get involved stayed open, I'm sure I would have. But I have a great deal of anxiety even trying to figure out how to get into another one.

What I really need is a secretary or a partner who does the work of making sure my work is sent out. Once arrangements are made, I can typically deal with people; it is often creating the situation where I am frustrated. I'm never sure what to do, and I just abandon things and do back to doing the work I'm comfortable doing. I have found some success in doing work on Austrian economics precisely because people keep inviting me to write articles and to attend conferences. I haven't had to pursue them, so I have found success in getting work published. This is also how I have managed to network, with the people at these conferences.

I am best when my work "speaks for itself." But of course, rarely does work speak for itself. More often than not, you have to speak for it, push it, insist upon it -- all while not appearing to be arrogant. Unfortunately, the confidence which arises from obsessively learning something until you reach a high degree of certainty creates the appearance of arrogance. Especially if it is combined with social awkwardness. If you don't know how to sell your knowledge/understanding well, you will always come across as arrogant. So such accusations seem inevitable.

In any case, all of this means that I need some sort of representative, a go-between to ensure I actually interact with the world, and interact well with it. Without that  kind of partnership, it is difficult to succeed. Constant creation is not enough; you also have to get that work out there. I am good at the former, but cannot seem to achieve the latter to the degree I should and must. Which is itself frustrating for so many reasons.