How does your social brain work?

[Southern Discomfort]

This is going to be very in depth topic with no simple answer but it's more like food for thought.

I was watching this video and it made me wonder how or do other people on the autistic spectrum think about other people, what's your brain's process of associating to people? In the video Brokenharbour talks about how he associates people with the objects they process and finds it odd how people relate themselves to other people and define themselves by others. So I wonder how other people's social brains here work do you also associate object with people like an Ikea lamp or does it work differently?

For me I don't associate people with objects. For me I associate "tastes" to people. These "tastes" can be "colourful" and are defined by the emotions I'm currently feeling myself and the emotions I feel toward the person I'm talking to such as if I find the person to be interesting or confusing; the situation that we're involved in like if it's a relaxed setting, and also the physical environment we're in. And because of these multiple factors these "tastes" will end up being multicoloured and no two with ever end up the same. This happens at the first time I meet them and as I get to know them I start feeling familiarity to them but I can also recall this "tastes" like a nostalgia pang harkening back to another time. I never associate these "tastes" to myself though and I don't have one about myself which might be why I don't really "know myself". Does anyone else feel like this or is it just me?

 

[Southern Discomfort]

I'm imagining now people will be saying to themselves "what the hell is he on about?" Ha.

 

[Ylva]

I actually think I think of people in a network. It's a workable system; it makes sense to me.

 

[Suzanne]

A jumbled mess, because of so many different personalities, I get confused.

Anyway that is the first thing that popped into my mind.

 

[laurag9g9g9]

I don't know myself either. I think it's about people's talents for me. I'm intrigued by profiling. Things like how they use their knife n fork. Respect tools? Mechanically inclined? present? If they are taking life for granted? If so, I probably won't remember much about them.

 

[Datura]

I suppose I engage with people like software. They are generally all the same type of application, but their content and user interfaces can differ greatly. Some people are malware.

 

[Mia]

Southern Discomfort Do know what you mean by associating people with colours and tastes. Some people I've known in the past I think of in terms of their likes and dislikes, X person for example had quite specific ideas about food, eating only peanut butter or tofu for long stretches of time, I think of her to this day as beige. Another eating only red foods or green foods on any given day.

Used to run a restaurant and the other chef could never remember people's names, he assigned people identities through their food choices, so A was the brie & fig panini man, B was the filet dore woman, and C was the asparagus omelet man. He didn't care about their names, only what they wanted, which for him defined them.

When I consider certain people from the past, I do think of terms of a colour which I specifically assigned to them at one point or another, so purple for example is related to a family member. Orange to another person, much of this assignation is related to how I perceive them, in retrospect what I think of as their true character.

 

[DogwoodTree]

I associate people with an experience of smell, not necessarily the scent itself, but my reaction to it...like "repulsive body odor" or "nasty perfume" or "pleasant earthy" or "warm smoke-pipe" or "nauseating cigarettes"...not words so much, but an impression of where the scent comes from and whether I can tolerate it or not.

I also associate people with a color or group of colors, and an experience of sound...whether they're loud or soft-spoken or talkative or withdrawn.

All of that kind of contributes to an overall impression of their energy. I don't know if it's the same kind of energy that new-agers talk about, but I get a definite sense of how pushy a person is, or how withdrawn, or how helpful, or how friendly, or flashy or boastful or needy and a whole lot more. Then I use these patterns to anticipate how they'll react in specific situations. It's like watching a fireworks show--if you know what's been lit, you can anticipate the noise level, brightness level, colors, and general shape of what's about to happen, so you can be looking in the right place, and also be prepared for anything overwhelming (like cover your ears for a loud bang).

 

[Southern Discomfort]

Southern Discomfort Do know what you mean by associating people with colours and tastes.

I didn't mean it literally, hence the quotation marks at the start. I meant it figuratively. I didn't explain it very well. Sometimes I think there are things I experience that words just can't explain all that well.. That's the closest way I could explain it anyway.

 

[Mia]

I meant it figuratively.

Do you mean that when you taste something like oranges, or smell them, they remind you of certain people? And that each person has a rainbow of colours associated with them? So orange and yellow and green and perhaps blue are reminiscent of one particular person?

 

[Ylva]

Do you mean that when you taste something like oranges, or smell them, they remind you of certain people? And that each person has a rainbow of colours associated with them? So orange and yellow and green and perhaps blue are reminiscent of one particular person?

Or maybe the other way around – when you see a certain person, you are reminded of how peppermint tastes, or you feel like you are seeing greenish yellow.

 

[Rayner]

How does my social brain work? You ask. My social brain is broken. It has never worked. Lol

 

[Southern Discomfort]

Do you mean that when you taste something like oranges, or smell them, they remind you of certain people? And that each person has a rainbow of colours associated with them? So orange and yellow and green and perhaps blue are reminiscent of one particular person?

Like I said, I don't means tastes to be literal. Like when people say "that's left a funny taste in my mouth", they might leave me with a feeling of refreshment or dullness for example. I know, I didn't do a very good job at explaining it but it's quite hard to put these thoughts into words.

 

[AspiePie]

I actually love socializing and want to do it more...