Why do we obsess?

Don't know if it's related, but I always look at a pattern on the tiles of walls, if everything lines up. I sometimes wonder... what was the architect, builder, plumber and contractor thinking when they built these things, was it for aesthetics or functionality?, it has always ridiculed me to this day. Another thing I wonder, how can a floor be devoid of columns and still stand, I mean the victorian houses that were made of wooden floor boards and walls of plaster and brick unlike the steel, concrete and glass modern buildings you see today. I am always worrying one of these days, the whole thing is going to collapse due to the weight put on it. Surely back in the victorian days, houses made of wood weren't expected to have a total weight of a vehicle, instead just a bed, wardrobe and a set of drawers.

You might call this an obsession, others have called me paranoid.

could be as simple as 'obsessions offer comfort'. my whole life i have emersed my self in different off beat activities because i found comfort from many them. i always chose things i would never have to share and often they would come with no need to prove achievement.

none have really causesd me problems apart from my obsession with always being an hour early. i have to be early no matter where i'm going, i even rise at a time to accomadate this particular need. it drives my family bonkers but offers me calm so in a purely selfish way i shall hold on to this one dispite it interfering with the status quo at times.

respect

rob

The qEEG is referenced against control studies of a database of a cross-section of "the normal" population.  This will include NTs who have all sorts of traits, including obsessive ones.

I agree that NTs can be obsessive, although they are likely to do it for pleasure whereas we do it for control, filtering out the outside world and other reasons as well as pleasure.

Undeniably autism is associated with intense and narrowly focussed obsession, but the point is that it is a distinction of intensity, not phenomenon.

The way it is usually approached is that people on the spectrum have narrowly focussed interests as if NTs do not. Because NTs are socially obligated to have multiple interests on a broader front, whereas people on the spectrum are more socially isolated, AS is more likely to develop more narrowly, and consequently more intensely.

If you do something a lot and with intensity you develop skills and aptitudes which will themselves tend to narrow the focus. Having a lot of time to do one specific thing is an opportunity for people on the spectrum, as a huge portion of the lives of NTs is taken up with social interaction, and if on top of that you aren't working or studying, having time on your hands fuels the focus.

You mention the results of brain scans. A lot of research on AS using this technology is about investigating AS phenomena in isolation. Can you find me any comparable studies of NTs who have deep and time consuming interests?

I'm not trying to suggest that autism research is wrong and I'm somehow right, with a clever spin asnd no data to back it up. What I am trying to do is to "play devil's advocate" and question whether the assumptions about autism are valid, given the research is often exclusively within autism and predictive.

What I can tell you Longman, is that my recent qEEG showed up a lot of differences, in both brain activity and connections (areas of over & under-activity and areas of over & under-connection).

This comment was also in the report:

"Inspection of 1 Hz bins (following page) also observe excess 11-12 Hz alpha in the frontal region. This is a pattern often observed in clients who frequently ruminate."

I don't really agree with your comparison of NT and autistic obsessions.  A key reason why, is that in autistic females the types of obsession are frequently "normal" interests in girls of their age, it's the intensity of them that is notable.

http://www.autism.org.uk/About-autism/Autism-and-Asperger-syndrome-an-introduction/Gender-and-autism/Women-and-girls-on-the-autism-spectrum.aspx

This is definitely the case with my eldest daughter.  I have never seen someone so deeply obsessed with their special interest, it strongly dictates her life choices - but to all intents and purposes is a popular subject.  Her peers, whilst only getting a tiny glimpse of her interest, have made comments on the level of it.  CAMHS made written comments about it too.  And none of them have seen how extreme it is.

Autistics also are very prone to letting their day-to-day activities slide because of following special interests.  I am very guilty of this.  Even if my special interests are a little more "diffuse" than some autistic males, the effect of them is the same.

I do wonder whether it is true.............

Yes we obsess very narrowly about certain things, but the two most obvious features of autism are sensory difficulties, and poor social interaction due to eye contact.

One way of looking ar autism is to treat behaviours as the cause. Another way is to try to see some aspects of autism as effect.

It has often puzzled me that, growing up, I almost entirely avoided the social culture of my peers. I knew little about contemporary music or pop stars or film idols etc. I seemed to make life difficult for myself by not doing all the things that could have connected me with my peers. I had very solitary interests in which I was mostly absorbed, but which amplified my isolation and created friction with peers.

Even when I took up collecting stamps it was for all the wrong reasons, I was intrigued by the patterns around the edges of Victorian stamps.

Now I had no diagnosis to grow up with. I've spent years analysing these things from a perspective that wasn't informed by knowledge of autism.

One of the things that puzzles me is not that I get very absorbed with narrow interests, but they are unconventional and do not support interaction with peers.

You see my perception of NTs is they obsess just as much, except their obsessions don't seem as obvious because they are shared obsessions. Humans seem to be designed to focus intensely on things but tend to do the things that help them integrate socially, or are directly linked in to social survival.

NTs not only watch football, they know the life details of all the players in their football teams. They store up huge amounts of detail from games - young people now use software to play and replay games to what seem to me to be absurd lengths. People obsess about pop stars, know every aspect of their lives and music, can sing all the songs of a favourite group. They watch favourite film characters in all their films and can talk endlessly about every aspect. Some can strip down motor car engines for hours on end.

I don't think that autism obsession is any different from NT obsession, except it doesn't lead to social interaction but rather to lonely pursuit.

So my not following the culture of my peers, while counter-productive, may have rather been that because I didn't socially integrate, and didn't therefore benefit from shared obsession, I didn't need to take these up, and indeed did not understand them.

At the present time eye contact and sensory issues are seen as peripheral issues. The explanation of autism is some mystery different wiring. What if eye contact and sensory difficulties are in fact pivotal and the primary cause?

That prevents social integration and benefit from social interconnection. And therefore focus, and resistance to change/need for routine, and other such characteristics, are rather the biproducts of poor eye contact and sensory issues.

But that sort of thinking - or rethinking of autism - aint gonna happen in my lifetime. The experts have decided they are right, so we carry on as before, talking about different wiring. Might as well suggest we come from another planet..... 

Due to specific wiring/functions in the brain that we have that differ from the norm.