Not with autistic people! And not a “large and unfettered repertoire of lines of actions”(same cite), but a derive-the-correct-one, real-time process. If there is a match with a stored fragment of action, things may go okay. There is a verification/validation step added to the process; use of an unvalidated choice is dangerous.

This slows down real-time interactions, lending an air of inarticulateness which may not be at all accurate - the person may have a lot to say. And what may appear as indecisiveness could actually be the search for an acceptable way of expressing a certainty. So perhaps the competence is in reasoning and associative thinking rather than in the niceties of interfacing smoothly.

And it could also be argued that the on-the-fly construction of a custom interface for each person with whom one interacts is an act of “interpersonal competence”.

Any for those of us with developmental issues, lots of choices have “expiration labels” which we’re also expected to read and act upon. Given actions become inappropriate; what was “ripe” at time becomes “spoiled” at another. Elsewhere I referred to figure skating - it’s as though all we’ve got are the “school figures".

Last revised: June 20, 2007
(c)2007 Dave Spicer
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