Ettina
Phoenix
Joined: Jan 14, 2011
Age: 23
Posts: 1994
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 Posted: Wed Jul 11, 2012 11:30 pm Post subject: |
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According to the AQ, this is an AS trait:
| Quote: | | When I’m reading a story I find it difficult to work out the characters’ intentions |
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CSBurks
Phoenix
Joined: Apr 30, 2012
Posts: 685
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| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2012 6:34 am Post subject: |
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| I don't read much fiction, but, yes, that tends to happen to me sometimes. Especially when I was younger. Reading fiction for assignments was a real pain. |
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ooo
Velociraptor
Joined: Apr 09, 2012
Posts: 494
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| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2012 12:33 pm Post subject: |
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Most fiction I've read I dislike.
Some of it's just not written well, with adequate plot and character development.
Maybe the book just sucks. Have you tried other fiction books?
Or, some of the classic works? Those are much more enjoyable of a read than some of the recent fiction junk I've read.
I prefer non-fiction, in general. |
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redrobin62
Doppelgänger
Joined: Apr 03, 2012
Age: 50
Posts: 4080
Location: Seattle, WA
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| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2012 12:43 pm Post subject: |
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These days I've been writing (and reading) fiction. I'm mainly interested in short stories and flash fiction as I have no time for the longer stuff. A lot of what I've read can be vague, though. The endings are just not (bang!) exciting enough. They're more like whimpers to a conclusion. Very unsatisfying, and like ooo said, there's been very little plot and character development. I get more completeness and satisfaction from reading Aesop's fables than a lot of these modern go nowhere narratives.
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RazorEddie
Phoenix
Joined: Jan 19, 2012
Age: 42
Posts: 608
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| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2012 5:51 pm Post subject: |
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| Ettina wrote: | According to the AQ, this is an AS trait:
| Quote: | | When I’m reading a story I find it difficult to work out the characters’ intentions |
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Heh. Up until recently I didn't realize I was supposed to work out a characters intentions in advance. I wait until the character does something or their intentions are explained in the book. That is what I like about books over films. By their very nature, books have to explain more about what is going on than films do.
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XFilesGeek
Pretentiousness personified.
Joined: Jul 25, 2010
Posts: 1833
Location: The Oort Cloud
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| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2012 7:01 pm Post subject: |
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No, it's not exactly an AS trait as it's not actually mentioned in any of the official criteria.
I have AS and have no trouble understanding fiction.
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Ettina
Phoenix
Joined: Jan 14, 2011
Age: 23
Posts: 1994
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| Posted: Thu Jul 12, 2012 9:13 pm Post subject: |
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| Quote: | | I have AS and have no trouble understanding fiction. |
Me too. But I also make plenty of eye contact.
Not every AS person will have every AS trait, and that item on the AQ does correlate with the overall score (AQ has a decent Cronbach's alpha, as seen in this study). So it's an AS trait, and the fact that you and I have AS and don't have that trait doesn't prove otherwise. |
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RazorEddie
Phoenix
Joined: Jan 19, 2012
Age: 42
Posts: 608
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| Posted: Fri Jul 13, 2012 4:24 am Post subject: |
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| XFilesGeek wrote: | No, it's not exactly an AS trait as it's not actually mentioned in any of the official criteria.
I have AS and have no trouble understanding fiction. |
There are many traits that are not mentioned in the official criteria. For that matter, the official criteria keeps changing.
As far as understanding fiction is concerned, how do you know you are getting as much out of it as an average NT would? It could be that you are missing quite a lot and aren't aware of it. I read a lot of fiction and up until recently I didn't realize I was missing anything.
This is one of the big problems with these self-report questionnaires. They rely very heavily on self knowledge.
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vanhalenkurtz
Phoenix
Joined: May 10, 2012
Posts: 524
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| Posted: Fri Jul 13, 2012 4:43 am Post subject: |
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I don't like fiction unless it happens inside a special interest. Example, I read every Henry James novel & short story in the early 90's, but had no use for any of his contemporaries. I like to read but it's almost always non fiction.
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LuxoJr
Deinonychus
Joined: Dec 03, 2009
Age: 19
Posts: 391
Location: a dance party on the moon
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| Posted: Fri Jul 13, 2012 4:43 am Post subject: |
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Fiction is only fantastic when the characters start to mean something to you.
It's like making friends, except you don't have to talk to them.
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RazorEddie
Phoenix
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Age: 42
Posts: 608
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| Posted: Fri Jul 13, 2012 4:51 am Post subject: |
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| LuxoJr wrote: | | Fiction is only fantastic when the characters start to mean something to you. |
I agree. That is one reason why I prefer novels to short stories. Short stories don't give you time to get to really understand the characters, setting and plot.
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edgewaters
hibernating
Joined: Aug 17, 2006
Age: 40
Posts: 2426
Location: Ontario
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| Posted: Fri Jul 13, 2012 5:10 am Post subject: Re: Struggling to understand fiction. |
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| SteelMaiden wrote: | I haven't properly read fiction since I was 16 (I'm now 22). My dad is trying to get me back into fiction. The problem I have is that when I read fiction, I don't understand the characters, I don't understand the plot and I hence cannot derive any joy from fiction.
Does anyone else here have trouble understanding fiction? Is this my AS?
Because I have trouble following films too. |
What about a historical account? Or a factual description of events involving multiple individuals? These aren't fiction but the content is nearly the same ... the main difference being only that one happens to be real and the other is not. |
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Atomsk
Bass Fiend
Joined: Apr 10, 2008
Age: 24
Posts: 1539
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| Posted: Fri Jul 13, 2012 5:16 am Post subject: |
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I have always had trouble keeping track of characters in movies, books, and shows. I often will know few if any of the characters - often just the main character, if there is one. The others, I won't know their names and such, or the list of what all they've done, sometimes even whether they've appeared before. But, I still greatly enjoy fiction. I also did greatly with history - I minored in history and it was a special interest.
But with history I am very picky - I cannot enjoy the history channel or history-based movies, because of how inaccurate they are. So if it's history it has to be things that actually happened, supported by evidence. I really love reading and watching primary evidence - documents that came directly from the people at the time, like for example, films from WWII, or diaries or biographies by people from the time - like autobiographies of important people of the time, or even peasants/slaves etc.
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