There exists a type of person that, when asked a question, will immediately respond with "Huh?" and then answer quickly after. I am one of those persons. A lot of people with ADHD have this quirk because it's like our brain is "loading" the new request and we're snapping into things.

The first part of the post is someone calling those types of people psychopaths because they don't get it. The second part of the post is someone more or less explaining what I did but in a way shorter fashion and without the context.

[–] Quill7513@slrpnk.net 14 points 1 week ago (4 children)

pro tip! just let the other person repeat themselves even though you already have your answer loaded. this gives you some advantages:

avoid answering what you think they asked the first time and answer what they're actually asking
opportunity to re-evaluate your answer as they repeat the question and make sure you still like it
after they repeat the question you already have an answer ready to go which makes you seem like you've got a high degree of expertise in the field even though it's just that you heard them the first time but were still processing

[–] Stamets@lemmy.dbzer0.com 7 points 1 week ago

The issue lies with the fact that is is not a conscious decision. It just... happens.

[–] curbstickle@anarchist.nexus 7 points 1 week ago

I tried this a while ago, unfortunately I would go off into something else in my head again and completely lose track of the answer I had at the ready.

So what I started doing to avoid that (but still hit points 1 & 2) is ask what I thought was the question back at them (in short form).

That seems to work well for me, maybe it will for others.

[–] user224@lemmy.sdf.org 2 points 1 week ago

after they repeat the question you already have an answer ready to go

Or I already forgotten instead.

[–] sp3ctr4l@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

You can also wait for them to repeat themselves and will often find that their idea of 'repeating' is to say something substantially, meaningfully different.

Then you just ask them to basically pick a lane, settle on one actual thing they are trying to ask, and they will often get frustrsted by the idea of having to form and settle on a single, actually coherent thought, and abandon the attempt.

Or, get very angry.

In either scenario, if either of those happen, its now clear you are dealing with either a dumbass or an emotionally unstable / heightened emotional state person, which is useful information to have for formulating your actual response.

[–] danc4498@lemmy.world 6 points 1 week ago

It me. My wife hates it. It my son too.

[–] Reverendender@sh.itjust.works 3 points 1 week ago

Ohhhhhhhh. This is not a feature of my particular flavor of neurodivergence. I will note this for future reference.

[–] WalrusDragonOnABike@reddthat.com 7 points 1 week ago (1 children)

My brain takes two attempts to analyze what was said sometimes? Either I'll have no clue what was said or I'll think something nonsensical was said, but it takes a bit for that second attempt at processing to happen and sometimes I respond based on the initial pass because I think I need you to repeat it.

Do you just understand things immediately generally or do you lack echoic memory, preventing you from making a second processing attempt?

[–] Reverendender@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

The first one. My brain automatically caches info and provides me with an instant analysis whenever it detects a synthesizing trigger data point in the convo. It’s super useful at work. However if I happen to be reading teams messages or whatever, and someone on a video call asks me a question at the same time, I’m 90% likely to have no idea what they said.

[–] ngdev@lemmy.zip -4 points 1 week ago

thats a lot of fancy words to say "i can have a conversation"