This works on a number of levels, although perhaps the most obvious is the divide between styles of thought on the order of “visual thinker”, “verbal thinker”, etc. People who differ here have to constantly reinterpret everything they say to one another, moving from non-native mode to native mode and back with every bit of data exchanged.
This is an important point and I would also add ‘social thinker’. That tends to be the non-native mode that I most benefit from emulating. I translate the words into what they would mean as bits of status processing rather than descriptions of reality and suddenly things make sense. I am not sure to what extent this kind of thinking is related to ‘verbal’. I don’t think verbally either, which causes me to be dumbfounded at times at the kinds of communications that people find most persuasive.
Could you give examples? both of status-processing translation and what is persuasive to verbal thinkers and not to you?
on a possibly related note, I think that there is as much or more variation from person to person in what is meant by “verbal thinking,” than there is between two styles of thinking named by one person.
Douglas asks a good question, and one that isn’t necessarily easy to answer. I wish there was a ‘leave unread’ feature here so that I would be prompted to answer it when I next browse.
This is an important point and I would also add ‘social thinker’. That tends to be the non-native mode that I most benefit from emulating. I translate the words into what they would mean as bits of status processing rather than descriptions of reality and suddenly things make sense. I am not sure to what extent this kind of thinking is related to ‘verbal’. I don’t think verbally either, which causes me to be dumbfounded at times at the kinds of communications that people find most persuasive.
Could you give examples? both of status-processing translation and what is persuasive to verbal thinkers and not to you?
on a possibly related note, I think that there is as much or more variation from person to person in what is meant by “verbal thinking,” than there is between two styles of thinking named by one person.
Douglas asks a good question, and one that isn’t necessarily easy to answer. I wish there was a ‘leave unread’ feature here so that I would be prompted to answer it when I next browse.
More than two years later—did you ever come up with an example?
Exactly twelve years later—did you ever come up with an example?
How about writing a top-level post about it with a few examples?