Long before John Gray wrote his book “Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus” there has existed a communication gap between the genders. I will say right up front, that I am no expert on this subject, however, I have a personal take on it, and as you probably have already guessed, it ties into autism. In Daniel Goleman’s book emotional intelligence, he uses an example of a power lawyer who sustains brain damage in a car accident. The damage he sustains literally makes him incapable of feeling emotions. As a result, the man became incapable of making decisions. It turns out that we use our emotions, as well as our intelligence, to make decisions, no matter how logical a person we might be. In the example in the Goleman book, the man was asked when he would like to schedule his next doctors appointment. He was incapable of picking a date, because there were conflicts with each date, so using pure logic, there was no time he could make. Where a person using intelligence and emotion, could give values to those conflicts. So the result might be, yes, I have conflicts for each date, but I can’t miss the meeting on this day, and this day is my daughters recital, so this is the least inconvenient time to schedule the appointment. By using our emotions to prioritise, we can come up with the “lesser of two evils”. Generally speaking women use more emotions in their decision making process then men. That does not mean they have less intelligence, just that they weigh emotions heavier in their decision making process then men do. Reciprocally, men tend to use less emotion, and more logic in their decision making process. So to create a simple example, when a male is deciding whether they can spend time with their significant other, conflicts in scheduling are going to be harder to over come, then a women who weights emotions heavier. For him, it is simple, he doesn’t have the time to meet for lunch this week. For her, it is a matter of prioritizing, making exceptions, and finding a way to make it work. Not only are they approaching the issue from different perspectives, but they are defining concepts differently. Meaning impossible to him means something completely different, then it does to her. We can watch what happens when we remove intelligence from the decision making process, or at least dull the intelligence, and amplify the emotions, by watching people under the influence of alcohol. The decision making process is once again compromised, this time in favour of emotions, rather then intelligence. This also clearly demonstrates that women don’t ONLY use emotion in their decision making process, as alcohol affects their decision making process as well.
Children, again in general, use way more emotion when making a decision, then logic. Again, it is not that they lack intelligence, but rather that at this point in their development, they are at the mercy of their emotions. Unlike the man who couldn’t decide because he couldn’t prioritize with our emotions, children are completely impulsive, wanting to make every decision based on emotion. Once Zane starts to get upset, you can watch his control on the situation begin to falter. His emotions take over, and without effort on his part, he loses control of himself. I have certainly been pushed to the point of anger by Zane, but once I rein in the emotions, I can regain control, and get back to trying to teach, discipline, or explain to Zane what I was trying to explain before losing my temper. For him, it takes a lot longer to regain that control. He will be upset for a while, and it will either turn into anger, or self reproach and self pity. Plus his emotions magnify geometrically. The more you try to show Zane the error in his way logically, the more he responds emotionally, using sarcasm as his self defence mechanism. I don’t think this is odd behavior from a child, Zane just finds very creative ways for nothing to ever be completely his fault. There by never being accountable completely for his actions. I should state that he has gotten much better about this, and that these episodes are becoming fewer and fewer as he matures. He still has trouble with the accountability issue, but that would seem to be a very human condition.
Holden on the other hand is completely different. His inability to express emotions conventionally, should never be perceived as a lack of emotions. He will be seemingly unaffected by most things, then have a very quick out burst of emotion, get very upset very quickly. Unlike Zane however, if you assist Holden immediately, helping him to express his wants, he will quickly calm down, and express his wants. The only problem is, if he wants are something that he can not have, he will go right back to being very upset, and potentially melt down. Once again though, Holden will get over his meltdown very quickly, once it ends. It always amazes me though, how quickly he can get his emotions under control, long enough to be prompted to express what he wants. He will go from starting to scream and tears flowing, to expressing his wants, if I just say “Holden, what do you want? Use your words.” With that question and statement, he immediately stops crying and screaming, and will try to express what he wants. Often he can express it quite clearly, with words. Other times he may not say the word right, then it becomes a guessing game. I can usually figure it out, but Zane almost always knows what he is saying. Zane may not get the big picture of what Holden wants, but he understands the words better then I do. One day I thought Holden was saying “I want ice cream” to which I said we don’t have any ice cream. Holden asked again, and I repeated my answer. Zane, who was working on his homework near by says “Dad, he said he wants to go hiking.” I then ask Holden if he wanted to go hiking, to which he gives an enthusiastic “Yes!”. The other thing about Holden, is that the more I can prepare him for a situation, the lesser the chance of a melt down. For instance, on Thursdays I pick up Holden from school, and then go pick up Zane. I don’t have to pick him up, he has bus service for every day of the week, but I feel the face time with his teacher is important. Every single time we go get Zane I have to tell Holden “Holden, no ice cream” because there is an ice cream truck that parks outside the school. If I tell Holden that before we get to the school, he will still ask for it, but when I say “no” he accepts that. If I don’t tell him in advance, he will have a minor melt down, screaming and kicking for a few yards past the truck. To me this demonstrates a mind that is more prone to logic, with huge emotional out bursts. It is a complicated mixture, that is always evolving. His behaviours create emotional situations, that can often be combated with logic. Almost the exact opposite of Zane. I’m sure every parent has to deal with each of their children in different ways, but I really can’t imagine parenting strategies being more different then when parenting one neuro-typical child and one autistic child. Maybe I need to write a book called neuro-typical children are from Mars, autistic children are from Venus. Doesn’t have quite the same ring to it, I’ll have to work on the title!
Children, again in general, use way more emotion when making a decision, then logic. Again, it is not that they lack intelligence, but rather that at this point in their development, they are at the mercy of their emotions. Unlike the man who couldn’t decide because he couldn’t prioritize with our emotions, children are completely impulsive, wanting to make every decision based on emotion. Once Zane starts to get upset, you can watch his control on the situation begin to falter. His emotions take over, and without effort on his part, he loses control of himself. I have certainly been pushed to the point of anger by Zane, but once I rein in the emotions, I can regain control, and get back to trying to teach, discipline, or explain to Zane what I was trying to explain before losing my temper. For him, it takes a lot longer to regain that control. He will be upset for a while, and it will either turn into anger, or self reproach and self pity. Plus his emotions magnify geometrically. The more you try to show Zane the error in his way logically, the more he responds emotionally, using sarcasm as his self defence mechanism. I don’t think this is odd behavior from a child, Zane just finds very creative ways for nothing to ever be completely his fault. There by never being accountable completely for his actions. I should state that he has gotten much better about this, and that these episodes are becoming fewer and fewer as he matures. He still has trouble with the accountability issue, but that would seem to be a very human condition.
Holden on the other hand is completely different. His inability to express emotions conventionally, should never be perceived as a lack of emotions. He will be seemingly unaffected by most things, then have a very quick out burst of emotion, get very upset very quickly. Unlike Zane however, if you assist Holden immediately, helping him to express his wants, he will quickly calm down, and express his wants. The only problem is, if he wants are something that he can not have, he will go right back to being very upset, and potentially melt down. Once again though, Holden will get over his meltdown very quickly, once it ends. It always amazes me though, how quickly he can get his emotions under control, long enough to be prompted to express what he wants. He will go from starting to scream and tears flowing, to expressing his wants, if I just say “Holden, what do you want? Use your words.” With that question and statement, he immediately stops crying and screaming, and will try to express what he wants. Often he can express it quite clearly, with words. Other times he may not say the word right, then it becomes a guessing game. I can usually figure it out, but Zane almost always knows what he is saying. Zane may not get the big picture of what Holden wants, but he understands the words better then I do. One day I thought Holden was saying “I want ice cream” to which I said we don’t have any ice cream. Holden asked again, and I repeated my answer. Zane, who was working on his homework near by says “Dad, he said he wants to go hiking.” I then ask Holden if he wanted to go hiking, to which he gives an enthusiastic “Yes!”. The other thing about Holden, is that the more I can prepare him for a situation, the lesser the chance of a melt down. For instance, on Thursdays I pick up Holden from school, and then go pick up Zane. I don’t have to pick him up, he has bus service for every day of the week, but I feel the face time with his teacher is important. Every single time we go get Zane I have to tell Holden “Holden, no ice cream” because there is an ice cream truck that parks outside the school. If I tell Holden that before we get to the school, he will still ask for it, but when I say “no” he accepts that. If I don’t tell him in advance, he will have a minor melt down, screaming and kicking for a few yards past the truck. To me this demonstrates a mind that is more prone to logic, with huge emotional out bursts. It is a complicated mixture, that is always evolving. His behaviours create emotional situations, that can often be combated with logic. Almost the exact opposite of Zane. I’m sure every parent has to deal with each of their children in different ways, but I really can’t imagine parenting strategies being more different then when parenting one neuro-typical child and one autistic child. Maybe I need to write a book called neuro-typical children are from Mars, autistic children are from Venus. Doesn’t have quite the same ring to it, I’ll have to work on the title!
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