I mean, I was kinda being snarky (I don’t think what I suggested is all that hard or unusual at all, though it obviously varies. I’ve noticed a few reasons for that:
-The person is failing to model the other as an agent, as a center of perspective. Their model of the person starts and stops at their own feelings and reactions; hence, if they find the person attractive, “X is attractive to me” becomes way more salient than it would otherwise be, in determining how they’ll attempt interaction. Men do this to women a lot, in general, but there are plenty of other dynamics or situations which can lead to it. Autism or similar psychological variance is massively overstated as an explanation for it; it’s way too prevalent a behavior in the general population for that.
-The person has no sense of whether something is appropriate or not, even though they’ve modelled the other party accurately (“is agent, has preferences”). This is very common among people who, for whatever reason, have had socialization issues. They usually know there’s a bewildering array of possible rules or at least broad patterns that might theoretically bear on the answer, but it’s not obvious which ones apply, or that they haven’t even thought of. To be honest, even socially-successful people sometimes have trouble navigating that, as soon as they’re in circumstances that are unfamiliar to them—another culture’s norms, or when dealing with a known charged dynamic and they’re concerned about signalling and how they come off. The trick is that there’s usually not any one right answer; it can be as specific as the nonverbal communication between two parties. Is asking for a hug creepy or unnecessary? Sometimes, if you can’t read the cues, you really can’t know short of asking. This means there’s always some subjective sense of risk; the problem is they don’t know how to calibrate that to the situation, don’t have a model of likely prior probabilities. All they really have is a sense of the variance on the options, which is incredibly wide.
-They’re failing to not-assume-yes. This is related to the first problem; the person is failing to be aware of, or consider, the pressure their request creates, or is equivocating the risk of being told “no” or declared “creepy” to be symmetrical with the worst-case scenario on the other person’s chart. For one reason or another, it just seems to them that if there’s no obvious reason not to, no compelling objection in particular, then obviously the thing they want should happen. “No” isn’t heard as a good answer in and of itself, not a sufficient report of the other party’s preference; it’s felt as somehow keeping them at arm’s length, denying them the information they need to know how to get what they want. This sort of thing is very obvious from outside, because it leads to different behaviors and responses, and body language tells, when confronted with a “no.”
“Hug?” “No, I don’t want a hug.” “Okay, won’t ask again.”
“Hug?” “No, I don’t want a hug.” “How dare you deny me what I want?”
“Hug?” “No, I want to lower your status, and this refusal is a way to do that.” “Okay, I’m a worthless and horrible person and should grovel.”
“Hug?” “No, I want to lower your status, and this refusal is a way to do that.” “How dare you rudely shun me?”
The usual way is to convey requests and refusals by cues too subtle for status fights. The nerdy way is to always interpret answers as preference reports, not status fights. Bad things happen in the intersection.
Which bit do you find challenging?
I mean, I was kinda being snarky (I don’t think what I suggested is all that hard or unusual at all, though it obviously varies. I’ve noticed a few reasons for that:
-The person is failing to model the other as an agent, as a center of perspective. Their model of the person starts and stops at their own feelings and reactions; hence, if they find the person attractive, “X is attractive to me” becomes way more salient than it would otherwise be, in determining how they’ll attempt interaction. Men do this to women a lot, in general, but there are plenty of other dynamics or situations which can lead to it. Autism or similar psychological variance is massively overstated as an explanation for it; it’s way too prevalent a behavior in the general population for that.
-The person has no sense of whether something is appropriate or not, even though they’ve modelled the other party accurately (“is agent, has preferences”). This is very common among people who, for whatever reason, have had socialization issues. They usually know there’s a bewildering array of possible rules or at least broad patterns that might theoretically bear on the answer, but it’s not obvious which ones apply, or that they haven’t even thought of. To be honest, even socially-successful people sometimes have trouble navigating that, as soon as they’re in circumstances that are unfamiliar to them—another culture’s norms, or when dealing with a known charged dynamic and they’re concerned about signalling and how they come off. The trick is that there’s usually not any one right answer; it can be as specific as the nonverbal communication between two parties. Is asking for a hug creepy or unnecessary? Sometimes, if you can’t read the cues, you really can’t know short of asking. This means there’s always some subjective sense of risk; the problem is they don’t know how to calibrate that to the situation, don’t have a model of likely prior probabilities. All they really have is a sense of the variance on the options, which is incredibly wide.
-They’re failing to not-assume-yes. This is related to the first problem; the person is failing to be aware of, or consider, the pressure their request creates, or is equivocating the risk of being told “no” or declared “creepy” to be symmetrical with the worst-case scenario on the other person’s chart. For one reason or another, it just seems to them that if there’s no obvious reason not to, no compelling objection in particular, then obviously the thing they want should happen. “No” isn’t heard as a good answer in and of itself, not a sufficient report of the other party’s preference; it’s felt as somehow keeping them at arm’s length, denying them the information they need to know how to get what they want. This sort of thing is very obvious from outside, because it leads to different behaviors and responses, and body language tells, when confronted with a “no.”
The hard part is forming an accurate model of the other person and situation.
Don’t worry—I’m sure those links are packed with advice on this particularly difficult subproblem! Why else would they be recommended?
Your last paragraph is excellent. (Others also good, last excellent.)
There’s a bit of confounding between
“Hug?” “No, I don’t want a hug.” “Okay, won’t ask again.”
“Hug?” “No, I don’t want a hug.” “How dare you deny me what I want?”
“Hug?” “No, I want to lower your status, and this refusal is a way to do that.” “Okay, I’m a worthless and horrible person and should grovel.”
“Hug?” “No, I want to lower your status, and this refusal is a way to do that.” “How dare you rudely shun me?”
The usual way is to convey requests and refusals by cues too subtle for status fights. The nerdy way is to always interpret answers as preference reports, not status fights. Bad things happen in the intersection.