The Expression of Empathy

In my research on the experience of people on the spectrum, I have heard a consistent theme: people with autism lack empathy; the ability to understand what another person is feeling and share the moment with them either in excitement or consolation. A great deal of energy is put into teaching the autistic person to develop empathy and learn how to demonstrate it in social interactions. I think this idea is oversimplified, and it is built on the assumption that if you don’t behave as though you have empathy, it means you don’t have it.

Most of us are born with a set of skills that I often describe as “mind-reading.” It’s the ability to gather all of the information being transmitted from a person; energy level, body posture, gestures, facial expression, words spoken, tone of voice, the expression of emotion, and many other subtleties, and put them together to make a really good guess about what the other person is thinking and feeling.

Horses and other animals have what autistic author Temple Grandin refers to as “extreme perception.” In her book Animals in Translation, she states that “their sensory worlds are so much richer than ours it’s almost as if we [humans] are deaf and blind.” She goes on to explain how autistic people are a lot like animals in this way. Instead of gathering the more obvious information and synthesizing it into what we call the “big picture” like most people do, they perceive every detail. This is where the barriers between horses and those with autism begin to fade; in the ways they perceive the world around them.

Horses have tremendous emotional intuition, which is what makes them so effective in working with people with autism. Like those on the spectrum, horses easily pick up all the subtleties of an interaction including the emotional field. The horse experiences emotions in a very compartmentalized way, without the complexity or confusing meanings that most people place on them.  Consequently, their only way of processing that information is to assimilate it, or feel it themselves, and reflect it back to the person from whom it originated. This means that when we observe horses acting out in an emotional way, it is likely that they are simply “mirroring” the emotion in their environment as a means of processing that information. In extreme circumstances, a horse may fight or flee in response to an intense emotional field.

I have experienced interactions with people on the spectrum who demonstrate this “extreme perception” that Temple talks about, and are able to intuit the emotions of a horse or another person with startling accuracy. Like a horse, their struggle is not in perceiving the emotion, but in making meaning out of it. The autistic person who picks up on another person’s fear of a situation, now feels overwhelmed and does not know what caused that emotion, how to make meaning of it, or how to respond to it. Because of this, the person may respond to emotion in a self protective way, instead of an empathetic one.  These attempts at self-preservation may seem to others as irrational expressions of anger, panic, disassociation, or shut down, because the emotional field is so overwhelming they must handle it much like a horse does, by absorbing it and reflecting it back to their environment, running from it, or protecting themselves.

It is important for all of us who regularly interact with those on the spectrum to recognize that the person’s inability to respond to an emotional situation in a socially appropriate way is not evidence of a deficit, disorder, or pathology. It is evidence that they possess a gift that the rest of us have not developed in the same way. Their emotional and intuitive connection with others and their environment is beyond our capacity to imagine it. They just don’t know what to do with the information. We can help them figure out what to do with the massive amounts of emotional stimulus in their environment; how to respond, how to take care of themselves. We can help them learn to make peace with their gifts, and how to put them into practice in a world where they are not understood.

It is clear to me that those on the spectrum are unique in their ability to perceive the world around them. This brings up many questions for me as I consider the implications of a growing population of such perceptive human beings. I wonder if humans are in the process of evolution. Are we moving toward a future where our intuition is more greatly needed? Are our most practiced methods for making meaning of emotion still serving us? Are those with autism leading the way to such a future? What do we have to learn from those on the spectrum? What do they have to teach us? And, how are those on the spectrum a “mirror” for our social culture as a whole? How are they acting as walking “barometers” for the intensity and pace of our lives?

I invite you to respond to these questions, and pose your own. Welcome to the conversation.

Tagged as: Autism, Empathy, Horses, Social Skills