How autistic people feel empathy (and why we sometimes don’t)

0:00 Introduction
0:02 Do autistic people lack empathy?
3:28 Selective Empathy
5:39 Emotional Understanding
6:10 Communicating Empathy Differently
7:50 Sensory differences
8:51 Different ways of expressing emotion
10:33 Different communication styles
14:41 The Double Empathy Problem

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▼▼▼ ABOUT ME ▼▼▼
My name's Loren Snow, and I'm an autistic public speaker and trainer and the CEO of Neurodiverse Training where myself and my team deliver training to tens of thousands of people each year about autism and neurodiversity.,

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[raven]

I got fed up with people saying I was "making it all about me" when I was letting them know that I understood them by telling them of a similar experience. It was like getting slapped in the face for feeling for them and being vulnerable. Now I just use one of their shallow, uncaring phrases like, "Oh, that's a bummer." Or "That's really hard." And they seem more satisfied with those. And they say WE don't have empathy.

[niamhira]

I struggle with empathy and understanding emotions of others. I'm an autistic woman, and I want to improve my empathy. I'm trying every day, but it's still not enough(

[heatherh]

Thank you, your super insightful and explain my experiences very well!

[fadhli]

*wall of text, don't read it if you don't want to, i not take hard feelings anymore so it's fine by me

to be fair, i think i have smiliar experience with that, try to care, learn to care, want to care, and hope to be cared of. all i know it just didn't work, never worked in many situation (not all, but mostly didnt work), in my 27 years of my life, not works to my family member, ppl get angry and told me that i was disturbing their peacetime, overall i was very confused, i want to scream "what de hell happened in here? i don't understand even a tiny bits of it".

some kinder dude that was my friend even ask "are you okay man?" and i say "i am okay, i am just try to express i was care to them, that's all" and then he replied with flat voice "to be brutally honest with you, i tought you have fever or have too much alcohol" and then to make it less tense he laugh it off before move to other thing to be talked to (man i love this dude, not in sexual way, he was dense like rock, slow to realize thing to the point i need to say "wait, you didn't realize that? i tought it was obvious", never take things personally, but very kind and very honest, helped me in many ways to understand the situation better despite his wording is annoying to be heared, and looks like he was wanted by local cops)

strange thing is, what i learn from him, is to approach things with "they dont care to me, i should not care to them, just tell what i need to say and don't expect their reply to be nice, say your words like you are throwing trash to trashcan, it will be awful but it works", and things went better, it sounds so stupid but it works.

being blunt and honest seems like preferable option to people around me, sure they get angry and yell at me, but angry people cannot lie, they will always be honest, if i can be tolerant to them i can learn something. didn't like that, never liked to do that, but what should i say, it works no matter i like it or not, just need to get used to it.

*i am very sure my word choice is harsh, i am deeply sorry if anyone get insulted, but this is what i know works the most of time

[mallsorts]

Just want to say thank you for all these videos Loren. They're super insightful and have helped me massively

[theo]

Nice video. Can people with autism help strangers? When? And how they can empathise with them?

[crikitten]

Is the "self story" thing only an autistic trait?

[potts]

I think empathy is overrated overall, it’s a one-sided exercise that attempts to understand others without ever really doing so; it is us speaking for others based on our own assumptions of who they are, which I think will inevitably lead people to trouble, if that’s all we rely on.

Even as neurotypical people empathize, clearly it’s not enough to make the world a wonderfully peaceful place. I suspect a lot of strain in global politics is a result of empathy and its limitations and misguidance.

[ioannafardella]

Sorry but that s your fantasy. A NT doesn t need experiences/socialisation/be teached empathy.