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People with autism less likely to succumb to bystander effect, research finds

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Re: People with autism less likely to succumb to bystander effect, research finds

#271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you perceive somebody who needs held and requires it as injustice? Helping others is an ethical thing, the right thing to do, but never an obligation that we owe them.

I experience this as well, it's a pretty common autistic perspective. Not sure exactly why. Seeing need can be overwhelming as a result as my brain is not filtering out the "should i weigh my potential discomfort to help this person?" question, in the way or degree that many/most neurotypical brains do. oddly enough, autistic people can have an extremely heightened sense of empathy and moral justice compared to the a…

Yes, I spent a lot of my life being very upset at a lot of people who weren't autistic until I read the studies that started coming out showing that it's verifiably the case that autistic people do various things that I have always thought of as "the autistic sense of justice", things that non-autistic people largely don't. For example, doing the right thing regardless of how observable your action is, or resisting social pressures not to break normalcy, or the OP's point about the bystander effect.

When I was in school, I was in the office as part of something else when another young girl began throwing up in the waiting room. There were between five and ten people in the room and the mouth of an adjacent hallway, most of whom noticed before me, because I was reading in the hallway. When I realised what was happening, I ran over to her and held her hair, helped her stay clean, asked the office ladies for a bag and help cleaning up so she could get to the sick bay without slipping, and generally did my best to comfort her. It was very distressing because I got some of the vomit on my hands and had to deal with that for a long time until I could wash them properly. This was not a gender thing because I wasn't the only girl among the students and the office ladies were female. Later that day when school was ending, I was in the office waiting to be picked up and one of the office ladies came over to tell me she thought I was very brave and selfless for having helped that girl. This made me really upset and I asked her why she and the other people hadn't done anything until I asked her for the bag, which got me in a lot of trouble for talking back to admin staff. The guidance counselor at school told me later that they didn't act because they were shocked, which didn't make any sense because they all learned before me so they should have had more time to recover from any potential shock and help, and it didn't make that much sense in the first place that someone just vomiting around them would put every single person into a state of shock.

That is the first incident I can remember where I felt this specific type of anger, but it happened many times in different contexts over the course of my life (once I started watching the news, it would happen very often because of the events depicted there). When these studies started coming out, it explained a lot of things to me and was honestly a huge relief. I had gone through life thinking that a lot of people who were otherwise kind were (apparently at random) cruel, or selfish, or prioritised doing the "normal" thing over other people being hurt, and I didn't understand why they didn't just do the right thing, especially in cases where it's not even hard to do. Specifically, it was reassuring to know that there was probably some neural or developmental difference that was causing them to act this way, and that it wasn't an intentional choice. I know being diagnosed as autistic and learning about autistic patterns of behaviour that I fit helped me feel less bad about how often other people complained that I had made them feel bad for responding to their emotions incorrectly, using incorrect emotions in a given situation, or making people afraid if I had a meltdown. It helped me not because I felt like it gave me carte blanche to just do these things which made other people uncomfortable or hurt, but because in understanding what was happening I could try to find ways to manage the effects on other people and counteract the parts that were anti-social when it mattered, for example by making sure to explain my tone and emotional affect explicitly in circumstances where I suspect someone has misunderstood it. My hope is that as more of this research comes out on why people who aren't autistic often do the wrong thing, it can help them to do the right thing more often and manage more effectively the consequences that their not-autism can have on other people, in the same way as learning about autism helped me to manage the negative effects that my autism could often have on other people.

Re: People with autism less likely to succumb to bystander effect, research finds

#272

I have mild autism (not entirely politically correct to describe it that way) without intellectual impairments and I frankly see normal people as disabled.

I have autism as well. I don't see normal people as disabled, just different. I think seeing normal people as disabled is a rather myopic perspective, and I sometimes hear it from the community. I don't like it, personally. Typically I believe because many of the times I hear it, it comes with a need for superiority of some kind, and that gets in the way of other various practical things. It's the same kind of tradeo…

I did find it interesting. Thanks for taking the time to write it.

Re: People with autism less likely to succumb to bystander effect, research finds

#273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just stop, people want dogs leashed in public for safety. This isn't some social order of insensitive assholes, this is because people actually get maimed by dogs and it's easier to have a blanket rule that all dogs (or all animals) must be leashed. There is no magical effect of some cadre of people trying to enforce some silliness onto the general public, there's a reason behind these laws.

I think the op is saying, and I might not disagree with them, that a world where dogs run free is a better world, even if it’s more dangerous.

I'm saying a world with too many of these signs in it is worse than one with too few.

I'd prefer to visit a park with unleashed dogs than one where busy-bodies were constantly on the look out for rule violations.

The second one feels more unsafe to me; more repulsive; more invasive.

A busy-body is a much worse creature than a dog

Re: People with autism less likely to succumb to bystander effect, research finds

#274

I have mild autism (not entirely politically correct to describe it that way) without intellectual impairments and I frankly see normal people as disabled.

I have autism as well. I don't see normal people as disabled, just different. I think seeing normal people as disabled is a rather myopic perspective, and I sometimes hear it from the community. I don't like it, personally. Typically I believe because many of the times I hear it, it comes with a need for superiority of some kind, and that gets in the way of other various practical things. It's the same kind of tradeo…

Thanks a lot for sharing your thoughts. They seem like a very healthy way to look at things that doesn't add the usual cliches one finds online and it's rare to read 1st hand accounts of this quality.

Re: People with autism less likely to succumb to bystander effect, research finds

#275
post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I'm reading the statistics in the study correctly [0], most of these 80 incidents (70%) were pulled from CCTV footage at a "night time drinking setting." Groups of 18 people on average standing around bars, presumably outside. In 20% of cases someone de-escalated, 5% of the time a bystander joined in to escalate the violent encounter, and 4% it was a mix of escalation/de-escalation. Presumably the rest of the time…

Yeah but we re talking about the real world. If we re honest, when do most conflicts arise with bystanders ready? When people are drunk at night... (or similarly mentally impaired maybe? why do people have open conflicts in the streets in the first place should be part of the theory). So you might say that if the theory didnt take alcohol, nights and all your factors into account, then it was as useful as considering…

Intervention by a drunk to stop the fight of more-drunks is part of standard bar protocol, plus inhibitions are lower thanks to alcohol

Doubtful it represents most real bystander situations where you actually need to make a choice, like situations in daily life where you are busy going about your business (rather than being in a bar literally for this sort of fun), or low key stuff like bullying, harassment, etc etc.

Re: People with autism less likely to succumb to bystander effect, research finds

#276
post #263
post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not the worst that can happen, not by a long way. You have very few rights in an airport, in practice if not in theory.

Have you looked up crime rates in airports or what gives you this idea that it's a dangerous place? Unless you're digging up dirt on Putin and flying through Russia or some outlier situation like this, nothing is going to happen.

It's not a crime when the authorities do it, sadly. I've seen plenty of anecdotes here and elsewhere of people being detained without access to legal representation and without even being informed of what they've supposedly done wrong. If you're denied entry to a country then you have no right of appeal or anything.

Re: People with autism less likely to succumb to bystander effect, research finds

#277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this effect seems to be especially true in airports. they seem to particularly inspire dumb herd behaviour. perhaps there's an increase in perceived danger leading to a stronger desire for safety in numbers? another example: queueing to board the plane. other than to fit in, why on earth would I stand there and compete to spend more time in a sweaty uncomfortable seat packed with 400 other people? plus, if you get on…

My intuition is that, in addition to what you mentioned and at least for longer flights, some people have residual effects from the mild hypoxia at altitude when they're on the ground in their destination airport. I, at least, sure as hell feel dumber for the rest of the day after a six hour flight. Usually that's accompanied by a fairly debilitating headache.

Too much CO2 is known to lower IQ scores significantly, for the duration of exposure.

Re: People with autism less likely to succumb to bystander effect, research finds

#278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you perceive somebody who needs held and requires it as injustice? Helping others is an ethical thing, the right thing to do, but never an obligation that we owe them.

They probably have a high degree of empathy and feel intrinsically moved to make ethical decisions. Autistic people can have high empathy or low empathy, just like anyone else.

Yep. Autism (and most other neurodivergences) is in addition to personality characteristics and types, not a substitute for them.

Re: People with autism less likely to succumb to bystander effect, research finds

#279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A situation where someone requires help but is not receiving it is unjust, because people's needs are not being met while others have more than they need. It is also unfair, because if you require help and have several randomly distributed attributes, you will receive that help, whereas if you require help and do not have those random accidents of birth you generally will not receive that help. That is definitionally…

This doesn't really makes sense. Two things that you mention, like determining what people need and role of random chance, don't have anything to do with justice. For me, justice is fulfilment of obligations between people, that we either take explicitly (as promises or contracts), or a very limited number that should be implicitly upheld by all — about aggression and property. But while helping others is a good deed…

Why are you censoring that word?

Re: People with autism less likely to succumb to bystander effect, research finds

#280
post #276
post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you looked up crime rates in airports or what gives you this idea that it's a dangerous place? Unless you're digging up dirt on Putin and flying through Russia or some outlier situation like this, nothing is going to happen.

It's not a crime when the authorities do it, sadly. I've seen plenty of anecdotes here and elsewhere of people being detained without access to legal representation and without even being informed of what they've supposedly done wrong. If you're denied entry to a country then you have no right of appeal or anything.

The danger factor needs to be weighted between probability of the event and severity of the event. The probability of the things you describe are near zero.
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