How do you think?

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It's just been bought to my attention that my thinking style is not normal. And the following research I've done suggests that people with autism have a wide variety of thinking styles.

I've always thought in conversations, rather than "thinking things through". When I was a child, I would think out loud as if I was a television presenter talking to an audience. Now as an adult, I have imaginary conversations with myself, often one sided. Even my journals are written unintentially in a way that seems like it's written to be read by someone else.

So, I'm curious, does anyone else have a conversational internal monologue? Or maybe you have another style of thinking?

Optional question: do you think your thinking style is directly related to your autism diagnosis?

Only that I have nonverbal mode of preferences.

To many, it seem like I'm just another visio-spatial strength types with average in maths and so forth.

In reality, it's way, way more abstract deep down; very abstract that it's also non-visual and seemingly spatial except it's internal.

Just that in translation something abstract into concrete mediums; visio-spatial mediums is more reliable, and made anything translated into verbal and language medium way, waaaay unnatural.


How much of this is autism?
It's the only thing that can be put under so far for me; in a developmental sense.

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My thinking style might be similar to yours OP. I tend to think auditorily with words like I'm narrating to myself weather I'm doing something, thinking things through, or daydreaming. I talked to myself a lot as a kid & I was doing the narrating out loud to myself but it was in a quieter voice than when I talk to people. I read various places that people in general tend to think in images instead of using words. I was born with an extremely rare low vision disorder & I heard that people who are born blind or with major vision problems tend to think in words instead of images. I also have visual processing problems which do seem to be common with autism. I guess my autism is a major reason why I have my thinking style but my low vision might be another factor or even a major reason but no more than my autism.

I also think out loud as I'm doing things or working things through.

Not really sure anymore! Definitely I used to have much more internal conversation dialogue (or rehearsals, and catastrophic arguments) than I do now.
I used to want to think in floating coloured shapes with alien meaning I could see with my eyes but that never happened, unless I took something - probably a good thing it didn't happen when I hadn't taken anything.
I think maybe a bit like what Edna says, some indistinct spatial relationships, bits and pieces of references, which need unpacking to verbalise. A lot of thought I might have difficulty verbalising, meanings of common words for example, if I stop to think about them, how do I express their meaning without invoking a synonym. Visual thinking? Imagining an a pear, picturing it in my minds eye. Can do, fleetingly, the stalk is the strongest, the bulb also, the green, dappled texture, bits and pieces of a jigsaw fitting together, but the whole thing? Not so sure.
Meta cognition is meant to be good for human brains.
I remember being confused when younger about all the different concepts of thought, emotion, soul, spirit, mind, ego, self, super-ego. Not sure I can really differentiate between it all, it's all of the same origin, the same stuff, it just is.

How do I know what I feel, until I see what I write?

How can I know how I think, until I hear what I say?


This, at least, is my justification: Sensory Feedback Loop for strengthening one's senses of what is, what isn't, and how much difference there is between the two.

Some scholars have suggested that everyone has an inner monologue, and it never stops during waking hours. If what you are refering to is an inner monologue then it's normal thinking.

I been sitting here a long time trying to think of a way to describe how I think. I have to let it go in fear of getting caught in an unresolved system loop for months about thinking patterns, walking in circles and talking to myself about it for hours a day.

I think that I think like all the great scientists did, thats why my only friends are birds.

Brave of you to assume that I think at all.

I have an inner monologue and imagine conversations about what I'm thinking about, often repeatedly rehearsing how I would succinctly describe a concept to someone. My visual imagination is vivid, I can do the rotating a photorealistic apple thought exercise. I don't think inner monologues are at all unusual as someone else has already stated. Though I don't know how repetitive the average person's inner monologues are, there are no new ideas under the sun and an individual's life tends to follow its own themes. Because of this, I expect some repetition. But I feel like I'm going crazy sometimes when I've had the same imaginary conversation 500000 times today or the monologue is just a couple of keywords over and over!

All over the place. I’ll sometimes be looking or reading something and have more than one monologue trying to figure stuff out. If I think I’ve got some leads my brain will repeat words that are similar or exactly what it is I’m trying to figure out.

I also tend to misinterpret things, or sometimes I’ll make big jumps in thought, distracting me greatly.

I was struck yesterday by the notion that there were two distinct styles of reading: by words, which used auditory machinery, and by meaning, using visual. Both deliver pictures to the visionary machine at the heart of intelligence, but that one’s work is outside most of our conscious thinking.

Does that share an image of how I think?

So, the main channel in my head is audio. That's the inner monologue, talking away to myself. On a secondary channel, there's always a song playing. That's the DJ channel.

Then there are the visual channels. So, I might think (in my audio inner dialogue) hmm, what do I want for lunch? Then I'll unintentionally picture a food. Or multiple pictures if I can't decide. I'll reply to that picture with my audio dialogue.

The daydream channel might appear if I'm bored. It also doubles as the anxiety channel!



I like to keep my idea notebook on me when I can. My handwriting is a crime in itself. However, I like to capture draw concepts and thoughts alongside words. This is when I draw to quickly capture the vague feeling or movement of something. It's not about quality. Rather, it allows me to express something that I haven't yet found the words for. Might sound a tad barmy but I find it helps me process a lot.