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Verbal ability vs social communication

The gap between verbal ability and social communication ability can,IMO, be quite large.   I do very well on tests of verbal ability, but I'm a lacklustre/far from good social communicator. The ADOS 2 had me at classic autism level.

For me,others may well differ, it happens in  both  spoken  and written situations. It happens relatively  less with writing than with speaking .

I'm not, and will never be, the sort to be a highly charismatic/popular forum member. To use a political analogy; I'm far more 'Gordon Brown' than 'Tony Blair'. 

Comments

  • I know what you mean, I always score very high on verbal communication/written skills and even IRL I get a lot of compliments both on my vocabulary and ability to express myself through words.

    I'm acceptable to medium in social communication after a lifetime of study and practice. I was a disaster in my youth though, despite having very good linguistic skills back then too. Learning body language and having friendly NTs help me with understanding and practising these skills made a difference, but the disparity between the two is still considerable.

    Another big hurdle in social communication is that no matter how much I learn or understand, I still cannot always process all the information and react accordingly in real time.
  • I've always struggled with things like body language. There's also the situation of NTs misinterpreting non verbal signals as much as an ND can . I had one MH worker(untrained) who was allotted to me to try and help me with anxiety . A regular comment of hers was that I came over as aggressive. It was a total misinterpretation of how I was feeling.

    Some time back, where I  lived before, there was a course for those who struggled with initiating conversations. A problem I have. Trouble was it was aimed at people with  primary psychotic disorders- a dx I'd had previously but didn't have then. I mentioned my difficulty to my care coordinator  who said she'd look into it. I never did get on the course.

    As a person with sz(also ASD) social skills including social communication are often poor . That may be stated in your psych notes,and other official letters, but it doesn't, in my experience result in actual  help for it.
  • HylianHylian Citizen, Mentor
    My writing ability and vocabulary have been relatively good for most of my life, but verbal ability I'm not sure of. I have a lot of issues with tone and innotation. My speech is very choppy and monotone, and I have a slight lisp. I can "fix" some of it slightly, for a short while, but it's still something that people notice and that I can't mask well.

    My social ability overall is okay. It used to be very bad when I was a kid. Learning how to recognize tone and body language was helpful, but took years and I'm still learning. Learning to mask socially and "monitor" myself was also a detriment to my mental health and now I suffer from intense, constant anxiety in social situations.

    I sometimes wonder if I got a diagnosis when I was tested at 6 if I would have gotten more help socially and wouldn't have had to find it all out by trial-and-error, and thus I wouldn't have as much anxiety.

    I had some speech therapy, but I probably should have gone through that a lot longer. I had a little bit of occupational therapy overall that was an hour in a portable at my school once or twice a week and focused on things I needed to learn for school.
  • kraftiekortiekraftiekortie Citizen
    edited February 2021
    What comes out of my mind both written and spoken does not match what’s actually in my mind.  

    I lack the ability to properly translate what’s on my mind via both the written and spoken medium.  

    Part of this has to do with laziness.  Part has to do with “not being able to do more than one thing at once.”

    I don’t present as well as I should present via any medium. Hence, people perceive me as a “lightweight.”

  • Statest16Statest16 Citizen, Mentor
    Effective pragmatic social communication can be quite different that language skills for sure.
  • I got decent pragmatically...but it took a long time.
  • Statest16Statest16 Citizen, Mentor
    I've gotten better to
  • I've always struggled with things like body language. There's also the situation of NTs misinterpreting non verbal signals as much as an ND can . I had one MH worker(untrained) who was allotted to me to try and help me with anxiety . A regular comment of hers was that I came over as aggressive. It was a total misinterpretation of how I was feeling.
    This is true (not even uncommon) and it happens amongst NTs too. Body language can be very circumstantial and most people read it automatially, without concioiusly analysing the data that much. While some of it is instinctive, a chunk is culturally learned, so a lot of misunderstandings and mistakes can happen with people of a different neurology, culture or tribe.
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