Neurodiversity and the Dumbest Generation

by Brian on 09-01-2009

Mark Bauerlein complained at WSJ.com that “Gen-Y Johnny Can’t Read Nonverbal Cues.” It has something to do with all the time they spend, according to Nielson Mobile, sending and receiving an individual average of maybe 1,742 or 2,272 mobile text messages per month.

And what’s supposed to be bad about that? Bauerlein’s concern is that “much of our social and workplace lives run on” non-verbal communication, and if they spend all their time looking at iPhones instead of people in-the-flesh, they won’t be very good at projecting or picking up on the right cues.

Users insert smiley-faces into emails, but they don’t see each others’ actual faces. They read comments on Facebook, but they don’t “read” each others’ posture, hand gestures, eye movements, shifts in personal space and other nonverbal—and expressive—behaviors.

But then as soon as I read that I thought of Tyler Cowen’s Create Your Own Economy, in which he makes a case that new technologies and practices on the web — precisely the ones Bauerlein has criticized — are empowering autistic and neurodiverse individuals to be more social and productive.

Compare the last sentence from the Bauerlein quote with this, taken from the Wikipedia article on Asperger’s Syndrome (often described semi-incorrectly as “high-functioning” autism):

Individuals with AS experience difficulties in basic elements of social interaction, which may include a failure to develop friendships or to seek shared enjoyments or achievements with others (for example, showing others objects of interest), a lack of social or emotional reciprocity, and impaired nonverbal behaviors in areas such as eye contact, facial expression, posture, and gesture.

Cowen’s great insight (not necessarily original, e.g.) is that those characteristics are not absolute deficiencies, they are merely differences. Society just happens to have been skewed in ways that amplify the weaknesses of the autistic-style while providing few opportunities to cultivate autistic-style strengths.

That’s changing — and Bauerlein himself helps make the case.

To show how valuable non-verbal communication has been, he reached all the way back to 1959, citing anthropologist Edward T. Hall’s research on the importance of non-verbal communication for “imparting feelings, attitudes, reactions and judgments.”

But what makes “feelings, attitudes, reactions and judgements” so much more useful and important than ideas, observations, criticisms, analyses, insights, explanations, etc, which are often obscured by non-verbal communication?

Speaking for myself, I vastly prefer the latter set; I’ve spent most of my life fretting about how under-appreciated those are, relative to the former set I’m less suited to work with.

I’m pretty happy about the shift. I don’t know how anyone could be anything other than astonished by the way so many autistic-style characteristics are considered flaws: e.g. the tendency to be “too honest” or the tendency to “interpret things too literally.”

It seems ridiculous. My feeling is that if our society considers honesty and interpretive precision to be flaws, then it’s our society itself that’s in need of therapy.

And again Bauerlein seems to help make the case:

Hall explained, U.S. diplomats could enter a foreign country fully competent in the native language and yet still flounder from one miscommunication to another, having failed to decode the manners, gestures and subtle protocols that go along with words…

Should we have read that as he intended — to mean those diplomats needed to improve their non-verbal communication? Or could the problem be interpreted another way? I’m more inclined to read it as demonstrating a case for relying on less non-verbal communication in professional settings… i.e. Why isn’t the standard manner of diplomacy more straightforward, explicit, and unambiguous?

Finally, the fact that text messaging is so popular isn’t just arbitrary; it shows there are human capacities for different styles of communication that weren’t fully realized in the past.

After all, there must be some psycho-social-anthropological explanation for the rapid adoption of digital media… 2,272 text messages per month, per person, can’t all be written-off as incidences of stupidity.

One final point in passing: this being a blog post, not a book, I don’t have room to address very valid concerns about serious cases of low-functioning autism. That’s another matter — though no less of one — but one I’m much less capable of treating.

phaedral

First, you offer a false bifurcaction: Set A, “feelings, attitudes, reactions and judgements”, contrasted with set B, “ideas, observations, criticisms, analyses, insights, explanations, etc”. Not a one of those words is sufficiently concrete to support the kind of reasoning in which you purport to engage.

Second, Hall's informed use of the term notwithstanding, “non-verbal communication” is inseparable from “verbal” communication. The verbal/non-verbal distinction is akin to the text/context distinction, which is to say, there never is one without the other. You might enjoy scanning Hall's “The Silent Language”, particularly the section on learning styles, in the nomenclature of which I would say your preference for what Hall calls “technical communication” is only that, a preference. A healthy human successfully navigates in all three, formal, informal, and technical.

Third, saying text allows greater access to those non-proficient in navigation of in-person contextual cues is arguably akin to saying printing dmv materials in various languages allows various non-English speakers greater access to the roads. True as that may be, it does nothing towards increasing access to the communication systems which in fact govern our world, those of interpersonal relationships and communication. (That is, Hall's formal and informal learning styles, and the communication systems associated with them, have far more influence than the technical.)

But, hey, anyone who cites Hall gets high marks from me, and I often enjoy a provocative post even when I strongly disagree with its premises and conclusions. Peace.
http://brianfrank.ca Brian Frank

Phaedral: Thanks, I'll try to be more rigourous in the future, but I can't always be so strict at the expense of generating new ideas and making things readable.

Now, I'd invite you to read more carefully.

I didn't purport to engage in any strict reasoning so I'm not sure why I need concepts like “ideas” to be concrete before I can use them. I appreciate there are circumstances in which it's necessary to be much more concrete, clear, and distinct — occasionally I do write like that — but this isn't a circumstance like that.

Second, thank you for agreeing that my preference for technical language is a preference: “prefer” is the same word I used. I also believe in balance — but my stated concern is that there has not been a balance: society has largely benefited those who are better at informal communication; now society is increasingly rewarding people who prefer technical communication — which might end up going too far — but that isn't as obviously bad as Bauerlein argued it is.

You already know I don't accept that position so why are you trying to use it as a premise to argue against me?

Third, I didn't say “text allows greater access to those non-proficient in navigation of in-person contextual cues.” I wrote that text might itself have benefits — nothing to do with affecting other modes of communication — that Bauerlein doesn't appreciate.

And finally, again, you ended up trying to use the position I'm criticizing as a premise to invalidate my case.

Do you have any positive or alternative suggestions?
phaedral

Thanks for the reply. I'll start at the end and work backwards, asking, “Alternative to what?”

One concern seems to be that over reliance on texting and the like is eroding a whole generation's competence at an invaluable skill set. To the extent that such a concern is grounded in fact (and that extent could well be zero) I would say any such erosion is cause for alarm. To the extent that there is a silver lining in possibly granting greater access to some who would never have managed that skill set in the first place, I would say a silver lining doesn't obviate the need for an umbrella.
http://brianfrank.ca Brian Frank

Phaedral: Thanks, I'll try to be more rigourous in the future, but I can't always be so strict at the expense of generating new ideas and making things readable.

Now, I'd invite you to read more carefully.

I didn't purport to engage in any strict reasoning so I'm not sure why I need concepts like “ideas” to be concrete before I can use them. I appreciate there are circumstances in which it's necessary to be much more concrete, clear, and distinct — occasionally I do write like that — but this isn't a circumstance like that.

Second, thank you for agreeing that my preference for technical language is a preference: “prefer” is the same word I used. I also believe in balance — but my stated concern is that there has not been a balance: society has largely benefited those who are better at informal communication; now society is increasingly rewarding people who prefer technical communication — which might end up going too far — but that isn't as obviously bad as Bauerlein argued it is.

You already know I don't accept that position so why are you trying to use it as a premise to argue against me?

Third, I didn't say “text allows greater access to those non-proficient in navigation of in-person contextual cues” — as in, I didn't mean access to in-person conversations, i.e. the same roads. I meant, we're building new roads — new kinds of roads.

[I edited that last paragraph for clarity.]

And finally, again, you ended up trying to use the position I'm criticizing as a premise to invalidate my case.

Do you have any positive or alternative suggestions?
phaedral

Thanks for the reply. I'll start at the end and work backwards, asking, “Alternative to what?”

One concern seems to be that over reliance on texting and the like is eroding a whole generation's competence at an invaluable skill set. To the extent that such a concern is grounded in fact (and that extent could well be zero) I would say any such erosion is cause for alarm. To the extent that there is a silver lining in possibly granting greater access to some who would never have managed that skill set in the first place, I would say a silver lining doesn't obviate the need for an umbrella.
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Neurodiversity and the Dumbest Generation

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