Please don’t anthropomorphise research papers - they hate it.
Object personification in autism: This paper will be sad if you don't read (2018)
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Re: Object personification in autism: This paper will be sad if you don't read (2018)
#22I don’t experience that at all, but definitely do associatively recall all the nontrivial uses / interactions I’ve had with items. It makes organizing stuff a mentally exhausting activity unless I’m in the right head space.
Re: Object personification in autism: This paper will be sad if you don't read (2018)
#23I always had the impression it was the other way around, non autistic 'normal' people personifies non human objects. Anyway I always had a pet theory that the reason some people are fooled into thinking LLM text output is a real human with feelings, and some aren't, comes down to this difference in brains. (Personally I never feel like the LLM is a real human and I'm kind of autistic too.)
I think there's different kinds of autism, which imv, you could spread across a schizophrenia axis -- "low reality" and "high reality" sorts. My own classification system:
The more schizophrenic kind imparts a fantasy framing on everything which can give rise to a disorganised imparting of mental capacities that I think is fairly uniform across objects, including people. This appears as "too few mental capacities" on people, and too much to objects. This a "living in their own world, dreaming" type. Dreamer-type.
At the other extreme, it's a difficulty in establishing any kind of fantasy framing (without significant support, eg., in video games / films). This is an officious, "the rules really exist, and we must follow them" type. Officious-type.
Incidentally, imv, there's a third sort you might call dissociative, where irony is the main mode of relation to the world and others. This is an unstable blending of the two perspectives: the ironic performative frame is at once a kind of fantasy, but a sort of fantasy which seeks to make the very adopting of fantasy impossible. Irony-type.
I think quite a lot of "high-engagement culture" (ie., the type which requires a lot of its audience) is really autistic culture of these varieties in interaction.
Re: Object personification in autism: This paper will be sad if you don't read (2018)
#24> We carried out an online survey, administered via Survey Monkey
This type of thing, where they do some statistics on survey data, seems to be fairly typical in psychology research. But I find it hard to believe that you can actually get good data from self-reporting in surveys.
There must be selection effects: "The survey was advertised on social media and through the researchers’ own networks".
And the questions may not be interpreted by the respondents as imagined. What does it mean if you select "None of the above" in their core question? That you think that objects have no attributes whatsoever? "Do you ever view objects as having: Gender / Human-like attributes / Feelings / Other / None of the above"
See also "replication crisis". Psychology is at the center of it.
Re: Object personification in autism: This paper will be sad if you don't read (2018)
#25I always had the impression it was the other way around, non autistic 'normal' people personifies non human objects. Anyway I always had a pet theory that the reason some people are fooled into thinking LLM text output is a real human with feelings, and some aren't, comes down to this difference in brains. (Personally I never feel like the LLM is a real human and I'm kind of autistic too.)
> I always had the impression it was the other way around, non autistic 'normal' people personifies non human objects.
The paper says, they do!
The surprising part is that autist do it too, at approximately the same rates, which was unexpected.
Re: Object personification in autism: This paper will be sad if you don't read (2018)
#26I don't have access to the full text, but based on the abstract I think it's likely that I relate to this phenomenon (I am autistic). My experience is not so much the attribution of human characteristics to non-human objects, but I understand why this might be the only accessible language of expression. For me, if a useful object is damaged or otherwise loses its usefulness through neglect or malice, I experience som…
I like the Japanese concept of Tsukumogami[0], where certain objects that live to be 100 years old become imbued with a soul.
It's easy to get sentimental over neglected things because I seem to have an innate appreciation and sense of duty toward objects that are designed to help people. It only seems fair that the contract includes care and maintenance from the user.
I live in an aging neighborhood and weep for some of these homes. I visited an abandoned unit just this weekend and went through the spectrum of sadness and anger that such a beautiful building had been allowed to fall into such disrepair. The unit was unsafe to live in, the foundation is cracking in two, one wall has a crack so large that you can see the outside and in several places, the floor is close to caving in. But the outside of the building is so nice. :(
We just bought a house in the neighborhood that is in mostly good shape considering its owners were older and lived there for over 20 years. I look forward to shaping her up, replacing the roof, refinishing the floors, repairing the foundation, fixing some water damage, etc. She's a great little home and it pains me to see her not at her best.
Re: Object personification in autism: This paper will be sad if you don't read (2018)
#27> We carried out an online survey, administered via Survey Monkey This type of thing, where they do some statistics on survey data, seems to be fairly typical in psychology research. But I find it hard to believe that you can actually get good data from self-reporting in surveys. There must be selection effects: " The survey was advertised on social media and through the researchers’ own networks ". And the questions…
> I find it hard to believe that you can get actually get good data from self-reporting in surveys.
Especially when you consider the Lizardman's Constant of 4%
https://slatestarcodex.com/2013/04/12/noisy-poll-results-and...
This article was written in 2013. The Internet has become a significantly more toxic place since then, and I would imagine the constant is closer to 15-20% these days.
Re: Object personification in autism: This paper will be sad if you don't read (2018)
#28I don't have access to the full text, but based on the abstract I think it's likely that I relate to this phenomenon (I am autistic). My experience is not so much the attribution of human characteristics to non-human objects, but I understand why this might be the only accessible language of expression. For me, if a useful object is damaged or otherwise loses its usefulness through neglect or malice, I experience som…
> A good example would be a dull knife. There's something "sad" about an object whose nature or purpose it is to be sharp to lose or lack that sharpness.
Interesting - I think you've just explained "Tear-Water Tea" [1] (Arnold Lobel's classic childrens story) for me.
[1] https://archive.org/details/Tear-waterTea-English-ArnoldLobe...
Re: Object personification in autism: This paper will be sad if you don't read (2018)
#29This is a good example of research that is too preliminary for anyone to form any conclusions about.
It was 400 people, 100 of whom report having autism. And it was conducted by posting links to the survey monkey survey on social media.
It might have some interesting follow up studies, but I find no reason to really take this for much other than an indicator that further study should be done.
Re: Object personification in autism: This paper will be sad if you don't read (2018)
#30I don't have access to the full text, but based on the abstract I think it's likely that I relate to this phenomenon (I am autistic). My experience is not so much the attribution of human characteristics to non-human objects, but I understand why this might be the only accessible language of expression. For me, if a useful object is damaged or otherwise loses its usefulness through neglect or malice, I experience som…
I agree, it's more like empathy for objects directly rather than assigning human anything to objects. For instance, I don't perceive objects as human, honestly if I can help it I don't even perceive humans as human. I have empathy for concepts that have nothing to do with humanity or with assigning things humanity or human characteristics. Nothing I do or feel is human-centric. I don't even identify human myself (I am otherkin)