For a long time, I genuinely thought something was wrong with me. Not in a dramatic, crisis-of-confidence way, just a quiet, persistent sense that communication was harder for me than it seemed to be for everyone else and that the gap was somehow my fault.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I’ve always struggled to put words to what I’m feeling. Not because I don’t feel things \u2014 I feel things quite intensely \u2014 but because the connection between what’s happening inside and the language to describe it isn’t always there. Sometimes I reach for the emotion and find only a kind of blankness where a word should be. I’ve since learned there’s a name for this: ‘alexithymia’, which is the difficulty in identifying and describing internal emotional states.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Research suggests that around 50% of autistic people<\/a> experience alexithymia, so I’m far from alone in this. However, it took me years to understand that what I was experiencing was real and common, not a personal failing. <\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Then there’s the processing. In fast-paced conversations, responses don’t always come quickly. It’s not that I’m not listening, as it were. It’s that I need more time to make sense of what’s been said, to sort through it, and to decide what I actually want to say back. In a world that prizes quick replies and reads hesitation as disinterest, that pause is constantly misread.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For years, experiences like these were labelled as “poor social skills” or “communication difficulties.” But that framing never sat right with me. It was measuring the way I communicate against a standard that only accounted for one way of doing it, and finding mine lacking. It treated the mismatch as my problem to fix.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What if the mismatch isn’t a deficiency on either side? What if it’s simply a difference between two communication styles that were never quite designed for each other?<\/p>\n\n\n\n There’s a concept that changed how I understand all of this, and I want you to know about it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In 2012, autistic researcher Dr Damian Milton introduced<\/a> the idea of the Double Empathy Problem. Milton proposed that it is not autistic “social deficits” that underlie communication breakdowns between autistic and non-autistic people, but significant differences in how autistic and non-autistic people experience and process the world, combined with a lack of reciprocal understanding between the two groups. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Social communication difficulties are not experienced solely by the person with autism; they are a “double problem” experienced within the interaction itself, and non-autistic people experience similar difficulty understanding autistic people as autistic people do in understanding them. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Read that again, because it’s important. The communication gap goes both ways.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This isn’t a small reframe. It fundamentally changes who is responsible for the difficulty. For decades, the assumption has been that people with autism are the ones who lack the social understanding needed to communicate well. The Double Empathy Problem challenges that directly. <\/p>\n\n\n\n From the position of the non-autistic observer, autistic people can seem to have an impaired understanding of social life and other people. But the issue is not a one-sided deficit in the individual with autism; it is a mismatch between two differently disposed people who are each operating from different social and communicative frameworks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This distinction matters enormously. Because once you stop framing autistic communication as a broken or reduced version of neurotypical communication, you can start seeing it for what it actually is: a different, coherent, valid way of expressing and connecting. Evidence suggests that people with autism often prefer direct language with less ambiguity and may interpret language more literally, including taking metaphors, idioms, jokes, or irony at face value. That’s not a failure of understanding. It’s a different approach to meaning. <\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Theory is useful. But this isn’t abstract. It shows up in ordinary conversations all the time, including at home, at work, in classrooms, and in friendships, and it builds into frustration on both sides when neither person knows what’s actually happening.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Let me make it concrete.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “It’s getting late,” a parent says to a child. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The implied meaning is, \u201cStart getting ready for bed.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n An autistic child may hear it as a statement about the time, say “okay”, and carry on with what they were doing. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Neither person is wrong. They’re just operating from different assumptions about how much meaning lives outside the words themselves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n i. “You might want to take another look at this,” a manager says in a meeting. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The implied meaning is, \u201cThis needs to be corrected.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n An employee with autism may hear it as optional feedback. Not because they’re ignoring the message, but because the message wasn’t said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n ii. <\/strong>“Just do your best with this,” a manager says as an expression of trust and flexibility. <\/p>\n\n\n\n An autistic employee hears an instruction without any clear criteria for success. What does “best” mean here? How will it be evaluated? Without a defined target, it’s nearly impossible to aim at.<\/p>\n\n\n\n iii. “This report has errors,” a colleague with autism says. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The intention is clarity and helpfulness. <\/p>\n\n\n\n A non-autistic colleague hears it as blunt or critical, having expected something like, “You’ve done a great job overall, but perhaps we could review a couple of things together.” Same information. Completely different reception.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “You’ve been distant lately,” a friend says, hoping for a conversation about what’s wrong. <\/p>\n\n\n\n An autistic person may not have perceived any change in the friendship, may have simply been overwhelmed or needing more alone time, and may be genuinely unsure what “distant” means or what response is expected. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The friend feels ignored. The individual with autism feels accused of something they don’t understand.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In every one of these, neither person is being difficult. Neither is failing to try. The breakdown is coming from a gap between what’s being said and what’s being understood, and both people are making reasonable assumptions based on how their own communication system works.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Individuals with autism often prefer clear, direct language. Many interpret words literally, without relying on implied meaning, tone, or social subtext.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Non-verbal cues, such as eye contact, tone, and facial expressions, also work differently. Avoiding eye contact may be about comfort, not disengagement. A neutral tone may be clarity, not coldness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Processing time matters too. Some autistic people need longer to respond, especially in fast-paced environments. Without that space, they can appear withdrawn when they\u2019re simply still processing. <\/p>\n\n\n\n These differences are easy to misread when everything is judged against one communication style. Small adjustments, including being more explicit, allowing processing time, and relying less on unspoken cues, can make communication easier for everyone involved.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One of the most persistent and damaging misconceptions about autistic communication is the claim that autistic people lack empathy. I want to address this plainly, because it causes real harm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Research found<\/a> that empathic brain responses were linked to levels of alexithymia, not autism itself. Once alexithymia was accounted for, there was no difference in empathy between autistic and non-autistic groups. This suggests that the empathy differences often attributed to autism may actually be explained by the high overlap between alexithymia and autism, rather than being a core feature of autism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In other words, many people with autism feel deeply. What’s sometimes different is the ability to identify that feeling in themselves or to express it in ways that fit neurotypical expectations. An autistic person might not notice from a subtle facial expression that someone is upset, but when it’s stated directly, they may respond with real care and understanding. That’s not a lack of empathy. That’s a different pathway to it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Alexithymia and interoceptive differences are common in the autistic community and may impact the ability to recognise dysregulation and self-advocate. This affects communication in ways that are easy to misread. It’s not disengagement. It’s often the honest experience of not having clear access to what one is feeling or how to say it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If most communication breakdowns come from a mismatch rather than malice, then the practical question is: what actually helps?<\/p>\n\n\n\n The answer is not one-sided. It’s not about autistic people learning to communicate “normally.” It is about both sides becoming more explicit, more patient, and more willing to meet in the middle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For teachers:<\/strong> Clarity in instructions matters more than cleverness. Vague phrases like “make it good” or “do your best” leave enormous room for uncertainty. Specific, explicit expectations \u2014 “write three paragraphs, each with an example from the text” \u2014 remove the guesswork and let students focus on the learning rather than the decoding. Avoid relying on idioms or implied meaning, and check for understanding directly: “Can you tell me what you’ll do first?” is more useful than “Does everyone understand?”<\/p>\n\n\n\n For employers and colleagues:<\/strong> Define what “done well” actually looks like. Allow written follow-up after verbal meetings; many people process information far better in writing than in real-time conversation. Respect directness as efficiency rather than rudeness. “This needs revision” is not an attack. It is information.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For parents and carers:<\/strong> Distinguish between inability and unwillingness. Silence or withdrawal very often reflects overwhelm, not defiance. Asking several questions in quick succession can shut down communication entirely. Pausing and waiting, even when it’s uncomfortable, tends to work better than pressing. Be specific. “Get ready for bed” is clearer than “it’s late, you know what to do.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n For friends and partners:<\/strong> If something matters to you, say it directly rather than hinting and hoping it gets picked up. Directness is not harshness. And when something has gone unacknowledged, try naming the feeling rather than withdrawing: “I felt hurt by that” is something specific that can be understood and responded to. “You’ve changed” is not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For autistic people navigating environments not built for them:<\/strong> There’s no requirement to change how you communicate. But some tools can ease specific situations when needed. Asking for clarification when instructions are vague is not a sign of weakness. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cCan you give me a specific example of what you mean?\u201d is a completely reasonable request. Scripting phrases for common moments, like “I need a moment to think about that”, can reduce the pressure of having to generate a response in real time. And telling people “I process better in writing” is not an unusual ask. It is useful information.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The most important shift in thinking about autistic communication is this: stop asking only who needs to adapt.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Poor mental health in autism may stem from recurrent poor social interactions with non-autistic people across the lifespan. This points to the need to investigate social interactions between autistic and non-autistic populations, rather than focusing the level of study exclusively on the autistic person.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When communication improvement is treated as purely the autistic person’s responsibility, two things happen. First, the non-autistic person never examines how their own communication style contributes to the gap. Second, the autistic person accumulates the exhausting task of constantly translating, adapting, and masking, which feeds directly into the burnout<\/a> and anxiety<\/a> we’ve explored in previous posts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Better communication doesn’t come from people with autism trying harder to fit in. It comes from both sides understanding each other more clearly and both sides being willing to do some of the work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Autistic communication is not a failure to communicate. It is communication shaped by a different way of processing language, emotion, and the world. Autistic peer-to-peer information transfer is highly effective, which tells us something significant. It is not that autistic people cannot communicate well. It is that the mismatch emerges specifically in cross-neurotype interactions, and the solution lies in that interaction, not in one party alone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Autistic communication is not broken; it is different. And once you truly understand that, not just as an idea but as a reality, the way you listen, speak, and connect begins to change.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" What if communication breakdowns aren\u2019t the fault of autism, but the result of two different communication systems not aligning? Autistic communication is often wrongly seen as a deficit when it is actually a distinct way of processing and expressing meaning. <\/p>\n This perspective shows that misunderstandings between autistic and non-autistic people are mutual, shaped by different ways of interpreting language and experience rather than a one-sided failure.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3911,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"give_campaign_id":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[73],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3910","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-autism"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.asoebipay.com\/autismthrive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3910","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.asoebipay.com\/autismthrive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.asoebipay.com\/autismthrive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.asoebipay.com\/autismthrive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.asoebipay.com\/autismthrive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3910"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.asoebipay.com\/autismthrive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3910\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.asoebipay.com\/autismthrive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3911"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.asoebipay.com\/autismthrive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3910"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.asoebipay.com\/autismthrive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3910"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.asoebipay.com\/autismthrive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3910"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}The double empathy problem, and why it matters<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Where it breaks down in everyday life<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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What\u2019s actually happening<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
A myth worth clearing up<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
What makes communication work better<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Both sides of the table<\/h2>\n\n\n\n