I’m curious why you would think you are the socially awkward one in a group of little brains. Does Kobe Bryant think he’s the retarded one when playing basketball with a bunch of Special Olympics kids?
Maybe it’s a cultural thing, but for me, whoever’s not fitting in with the group is the awkward one. Kobe probably wouldn’t feel retarded, but he would feel left out and awkward, because he’d realize he wasn’t fitting in with the group.
When it come to smarts stuff, those in the group that’s less-smart tends to get defensive, too, which doesn’t help (Although, I’m willing to admit that may be a perception on my part), and think the smart person is trying to “show off” or make them feel stupid or something like that.
I was smarter than my peers at school, and being smart was uncool at that public school. The teachers always loved me and that was uncool, too. I craved the approval of adults (due to my parents’ extremely shady parenting) and largely didn’t care about what my peers thought of me. I learned to read young, and for years that’s all I did for recreation. I preferred reading to going out and doing social things.
When I got to the point where maybe I wanted to try going out and doing social things (in high school around age 14), my mother wouldn’t allow me to be driven around by other people so my social options were limited to what I did during school hours (I was also not allowed to get a driver’s license while living under her roof). Being focused on doing well in my classes didn’t leave a lot of time for recreation.
Except for a short “follower” stint in middle school, I just never focused energy into being popular. Plus I was a fat chick and fat chicks are never traditionally popular (at least, not at my school). They may carve out a niche as the funny fat girl, but I wasn’t interested.
I think I was seen as one of those people with a midas touch, who was good at everything I tried (English, science, music, writing), except when it comes to people. I was never good at people. I possibly also came off as condescending because using big (or outmoded) words came naturally, due to reading way too much.
Also in my younger innocent years, I got used for my intelligence a couple times by popular kids. After that I had major trust issues with anyone who was traditionally attractive.
Yes… been there. It’s too easy to let that vocabulary slip out. It takes energy to keep it suppressed all the time. (Wait, is “suppressed” considered a “big word”?)
Lately, though, I’ve turned it to my advantage in writing historical fiction. 
My problem is that I don’t fit the smart stereotype. I am an extrovert,sports jock with long hair, ear rings and tattoos. I ride a custom built motorcycle and love to play drums and guitar at parties and I don’t back down from a bar fight. Most people don’t think I am any smarter than average. The problems always come for me when I am talking to people and I can watch their eyes glaze over. I find most conversations tend to only skim the surface of the issue and I tend to be more interested in a more in depth version of the topic.It seems I have way too much info to share on the subject or my words are too big. First it’s the “Huh, Where did that come from?”, then it goes to the eyes glazing over because I have lost them. I am truly working on it, even at this late stage in the game, but I can’t help myself because I love to have deep conversations about things.
The other probem is when something needs to be fixed or figured out, like this past weekend for example. The guy who I was travelling with to the hockey tournament had a GPS in the truck but had no idea how to use it, neither did the other two guys in the truck. I have never used one before but it onle took about a minute to figure out the route planning and we were on our way. They seemed happy that I got it working but at the same time you could feel the “Fucking Smart Ass” thoughts in their heads. I know the GPS thing is not a big deal but it was something recent that I thought of and this happens all the time, drives me nuts. Sometimes I say to myself “Just shutup and don’t get involved”, but I can’t help myself, I hate wathing people struggle and contiue to get farther away frm their goal when all they have to do is let me fix it. Once again I am working on it, but it’s hard.
On a side note I was saying to my wife the other day that maybe that is the problem with the world today, we just take what we are told as gospel and spend no time researching the facts to have a better understanding of the issue.
Many simply have a hard time relating to average people. When faced with a conversation about a banal topic they know little about they have nothing to add. Then, trying to think of something relevant to say they often can’t come up with anything that they fear won’t be perceived as “know it all-y”. I learned a long time ago when asked about a subject I have no interest in, to simply reply that I don’t watch/listen to/have read/ have an opinion on or subscribe to that subject matter. Even if it is the most popular thing going. Even if it is the big topic of conversation. People think I’m weird, but they still like me because I make a huge effort to NOT be condescending or steer the conversation to topics I know will be Greek to them.
Like many (OK, everyone) who’s posted, I’m fairly intelligent. I had a hard time relating to my peers through high school but I’m not sure that’s because of my intelligence. There were other smart people who did have lots of friends. But I do think sometimes that can be a nice cover. You know, it’s not me, it’sthem, and it’s them not appreciating this really awesome trait of mine. Not that that’s always the case but maybe in some.
I think being able to empathize with people, especially people who dont share your interests is critical. Its easy for someone to essentially have a conversation with themselves. Socializing is a 2 way street. Contrary to what some of us think, people dont want to go to a party to hear some know it all giving a lecture. A lot of this social awkwardness is simply selfishness. The “smart” person wants to talk about what THEY find interesting. Me, I try to find some common ground with people and ask them questions or their opinions. Once people feel you value what they have to say a conversation with them no longer feels like swimming in mollasses.
Thanks for that, I enjoyed it very much.
This is very true.
But I don’t believe this is, for two reasons.
1 - it doesn’t correlate with intelligence; there are plenty of average or below-average intelligence people who will ramble on and on and on about their particular interests and not notice that everyone’s eyes are glazing over*.
2 - “Selfishness”, at least in how I read your sentence, implies intent or conscious awareness of the faux pas; I honestly believe that many people truly do not realize they’re commandeering the conversation and ignoring other people. It’s still rude but unintentional.
The fact is that social interactions have tons and tons of rules but they’re only obvious if you have a natural gift/ability with social skills. How is someone who lacks those skills going to learn these rules? They can’t just “pick them up”, even with lots of observing (if they could, they’d already know the rules).
Socially-savvy people have an intuitive understanding of these rules (how to interact, how to gauge people’s interest, how to adjust your conversation to the room, etc.) and often can’t believe others don’t “get” them because they’re so obvious. There are tons of artistic people who have intuitive understanding of things like proportions, spatial relationships and perspective; it doesn’t mean that the rest who have to actually be taught these (with lectures, examples, comparisons, practice, etc.) are stupid or that they can’t learn them, either.
Social skills are like any other skills: some people will be naturally gifted and catch on very quickly and others will need instruction and guidance. Being in the latter group doesn’t make you a failure, but it’s very easy for the former to condescend to them (god, it’s so freaking obvious! What’s your problem??) and for them to feel defensive/reactionary (screw you! I’m busy knowing X,Y and Z instead and they’re more important anyway!).
- Which just made me think of Stryker in Airplane! telling his story and everyone committing suicide to not have to listen to him anymore.
I also think this is confirmation bias. I’ve known plenty of smart people who were socially awkward, but plenty that were not. My uncle was chairman of the physics department of a major university, and he is one of the most social persons I know. He has friends all over the world.
I thought of something else after the edit window closed (naturally).
I was actually discussing the importance of empathy in social interactions with a friend a few days ago. There are friends of mine who are most definitely socially awkward and can be rude/thoughtless/offensive without having any idea they are. I was venting a bit and explained that it’s still extremely frustrating, even though I know that they don’t mean to cause offense.
We came to the conclusion that empathy itself is a two way street. On one hand, you should be able to empathize with others so as not to hog the conversation or say something offensive. But on the other hand, if someone does say something offensive (or dominates the conversation), you should also empathize with that person to see why they’re doing it. Sure, they may just be a jerk :D, but it’s also quite possible that they have no ill intent and would be upset if they knew they had offended others.
Quoted for truth. I absolutely agree.
I don’t agree with you. First, people learn social skills throughout their lives. It’s not innate. And second, I see a lot of evidence that some people (not most, maybe, but some) who don’t have much in the way of social skills are choosing to be that way. They sneer at socializing, have contempt for others, bitch and moan about average people having average conversations, etc. Not all, but some social misfits like it that way, choose to be that way, and think it makes them superior and smarter than everyone else.
I think zweisamkeit is onto something with the rules part. Another aspect of the social rules is that people may see that the rules exist, but not understand the operation, because the rules aren’t codified like a legal code, or fixed like the Ideal gas law.
It’s not that smart folks don’t realize that the rules exist, it’s that in many cases, they don’t understand how they operate and don’t want to put in the time or effort to gain the experience, for whatever reason. It took me a LONG time to figure out when women were interested in me, and I wanted to learn! It just changed from woman to woman and between stages of life, and even situations.
I have to +1 this-
it is when I began to be a somewhat likeable human being…
IME, the penalties for being smart, in and of itself, are not nearly as harsh as the penalties for not being an athlete if you’re stuck in a jockocracy.
Exactly. I’m kind of surprised by how many people in this thread are describing conversations where everyone elses eyes glazed over and they didn’t seem interested, and they assume it’s because the people they’re talking to are too dumb to get it. Maybe you’re just being boring?
Speaking only for myself, I am sometimes socially awkward because :
A.) I don’t share the interests of my peers, or…
B.) I overthink things.
If you’re talking about sports, cars, drinking, wrestling, hunting, country music… I’m going to be socially awkward because my interest in those things is zero. Around here, that means the only tolerable small talk I can do is about the weather.
As to the other possibility - I’m very analytical, so while this means I’m very good at seeing possible double entendres, puns, hidden meanings, hints, and innuendo - it also means that I sometimes suspect them where none are intended, and sometimes get distracted parsing what the other person is saying. Alternately, while someone is talking to me, I may just be thinking about something else. Especially if they’re trying to make small talk about sports, cars, drinking…