Multitasking

Do people on the spectrum multitask? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

“Okay. This seminar is on Greek and I will be taking that at Seminary. I’d better just put my laptop down and listen entirely.”

So I said at the last ETS meeting that I went to. Robert Plummer was giving a talk and I knew this would be helpful. Let’s make sure there were no distractions.

I don’t remember a single word that was said in the talk.

Meanwhile, there were plenty of talks that I had my laptop out with me and was doing work on it at the time and I remembered very well what was said. I have since found that this is the way that I work. If I can keep my hands doing something else normally at the time, it is easier for me to pay attention.

My former in-laws discovered this once when I came to visit and I was sitting on the couch for some conversation and playing my 3DS. At the time, they thought I was being rude. Then they realized that I was able to explain everything that they said and repeat it back to them.

I like to educate myself watching YouTube videos on my Echo and I play a game at the same time. It works for me. I know what is going on. It keeps my mind from wandering. A friend of mine who attended Defend with me this year remembers me being in a talk and doing a word game on my phone and one on my Kindle at the same time and still knowing what was going on.

When I spoke to Defend myself on Autism and Christianity, I spoke about multitasking. Sometime recently, I had a mother come to me at the Post Office where I work and saying she has a daughter who is high-functioning and they just couldn’t get her to focus during lessons in homeschooling and she was struggling. Then she remembered what I said and told her daughter, “I will let you play a coloring game on the phone during the lesson.”

Her daughter aced the material then.

Sometimes if I am in a group conversation, I get my phone out and I do explain to people that this is something that actually helps me focus and they actually do understand a number of times. It’s different during a one-on-one conversation when I am actively engaged, but doing something helps me stay focused. It’s hard when so many people think this is rude when the reason that I am doing this is to avoid being rude.

When people on the spectrum come to your church, please keep this in mind. If they are small children, you could consider having small activities that they could do during the service, such as coloring. If they are older and say that they need their phones out to focus, then consider that that could be something that could help them out. Again, not all people on the spectrum are like this, but some are. Be aware of that.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)