Why Geek Geniuses Lack Social Graces: Shadow Syndromes

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Why Geek Geniuses Lack Social Graces: Shadow Syndromes

Wednesday, September 15, 1999

[Norman Doidge, On Human Nature, National Post. Dr. Doidge is a

research psychiatrist and psychoanalyst. " Shadow Syndromes " is sometimes

referred to as Latent Autistic Personality Syndrome or LAPS by some amateur

nerdologists. Thanks to Alvin M. Crofts II on the SJU Autism list. -ls]

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology, perhaps the finest

post-graduate school for mathematical and computer minds in the world, has a

course that teaches its entering geniuses the most basic social skills --

often at a rudimentary level. MIT students wittily dub it " charm school. "

Many of the best and the brightest minds in science, math and computers are

often physically and socially clumsy, and they know it. They've been teased

mercilessly for being " klutzes " of one sort or another most of their lives.

Ten years ago, Dr. Forrest, a psychoanalyst who had studied

schizophrenics, turned his research attention to those who are designated

" nerds, " " geeks " and " space-cadets, " to understand why so many with superior

mental abilities are uncoordinated, come with plastic pen packs in smudged

shirt pockets, have an often whiny voice with a mechanical timbre, and a

sudden loud, peculiar, foghorn laugh and snort.

He wondered why a " nerd " stoops to take such a close look at what

interests him, sniffing his food if it smells funny, placing his nose right

in it, " locking on " with his eyes. Forrest wondered if there was some

special relationship between certain kinds of intelligence and the absence

of physical and social graces.

Now there's a book, Shadow Syndromes, that begins to answer Forrest's

questions, and many more. Shadow Syndromes, by Harvard psychiatrist

Ratey (co-authored with [yes, our very same. -ls]), sets

off a cascade of " aha " reactions that significantly alter one's conception

of oneself and others.

It's only in the last few decades that we have learned that most of the

major mental disorders have " shadow syndromes " or milder versions. Ratey's

and 's book brilliantly describes numerous shadow syndromes -- masked

depressions (that show up in those who are always " being difficult " ), less

severe manias, obsessive-compulsive disorders, rages, and attention

deficits, all of which influence our work and love lives.

For instance, Shadow Syndromes builds a powerful case that many of us

" nerds " are at the mildest end of a spectrum of autistic disorders. Till

recently, autism was believed to exist only in a severe form. Autistic kids

have profound difficulty connecting with people, and always appear " out of

it. " But many have neurological difficulties as well.

Autistic infants, when startled, can't turn off the startle response.

They are hypersensitive, and are well-known to spend hours rocking or moving

their hands rhythmically, to soothe themselves. But 10 years ago,

Ritvo of UCLA, in an attempt to study autistic children, went around Utah,

and spoke to the parents of every known autistic child in the state.

He discovered that a number of the parents were mildly autistic

themselves. Some were socially isolated, had autistic ways of walking (were

" odd ducks " ) and spent long hours rocking. Suddenly, it seemed that along

with some well-known physical causes, there was likely a genetic component

to autism. As well, the psychoanalytic observation that some autistic kids

had parents who could not connect with them seemed not so far-fetched: Some

of these parents were autistic.

Mildly autistic people have a characteristic, Mr. Spock-like way of

speaking -- overly formal, with little emotion. They have trouble

understanding the meaning of tone changes in speech and can't easily make

small talk. They can't read people. One of Dr. Ratey's patients, , a

socially awkward computer programmer and a 34-year-old virgin, who might

have passed for neurotic, couldn't empathize at all.

Never having known what empathy was, when others understood him, he

felt they had invaded his mind. He showed the signs of physical awkwardness

and couldn't dance unless someone physically guided each step. (Many

autistic kids can't skip, or clap in time to music, and have problems with

rhythm and balance.)

Co-ordination of movement and balance are known to be regulated by the

part of the brain called the cerebellum. We now know, from brain scan

studies by Courchesne, that the cerebellum is significantly

underdeveloped in autism. It has also recently been shown, to the surprise

of many, that the cerebellum co-ordinates both physical movement and the

shifting of attention.

This finding is momentous. It led Courchesne to ask, " What would

happen to the infant who comes into the world with cerebellar damage, and a

clumsy attentional apparatus? " Courchesne showed that it took these kids six

seconds to shift attention, and hypothesized that this was not fast enough

to make out the fleeting sweeps of emotional expression and social

information.

A smile erupts and disappears in a moment on a mother's face. The

child who cannot catch it, or who can't shift his attention quickly enough

to see what the mother is smiling at, feels " out of it. " At best, he catches

the shadow of her smile. Thus, he cannot " tune in " to people, or share in a

moment of joy. Later on, he may learn to tediously calculate what others

are feeling, but that is hard work, indeed.

This cerebellar slowness may also explain some of the intellectual

feats of the mildly autistic " computer nerds " that are now reorganizing the

planet. (Bill Gates, according to Shadow Syndromes, is reported to rock

himself, spend hours on the trampoline, not make eye contact, and have

trouble making social conversation.) It is not just that computers provide

an alternative to direct contact with people.

Many mildly autistic people are right-brain types, often with great

visual-spatial skills. Silicon Valley is filled with shy, awkward geniuses,

who are able to be obsessed with certain interests or ideas; never letting

go of them, they are able to make connections and discoveries the rest of us

cannot.

But more importantly, because attention shifting is slowed, autistic

people experience life as a series of freeze frames. Thus, they have

trouble perceiving the whole. But they are far better than " normal " people

at perceiving the parts. Some autistic artists can reproduce, in perfect

detail, a building only seen once; the " normal " artist starts from a sketch

of the whole, then fills the details in. Autistic people can see things out

of context -- the starting point for invention.

Ratey and state that neuroscience " is proving Freud right:

probably none of us is 'normal' -- normal in the sense of possessing a brain

in which every part and system works as well as every other part and

system -- and all functions lie well within an optimal range. "

In Shadow Syndromes you may just recognize your own " noisy " brain and

the way it, for evolutionary reasons, biases how you process information.

It's getting late in 1999, so it's not too early to recommend Shadow

Syndromes as one of the most fascinating books on psychiatry, for the

general reader, of the decade.

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editor: Lenny Schafer east coast editor: , Ph.D.

schafer@... CIJOHN@...

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