FAQ on context sensitivity

I think my boss is a narcissist. How should I deal with this?

The term narcissist in psychiatry refers to a DSM personality disorder. However, such a diagnosis says little about a person’s individuality or how he/she functions in an organization. Within the framework of Context Thinking, a simpler explanation often applies: the manager is likely low-contextual.

Low-contextual thinking

Many managers who are perceived as "narcissistic" are in fact low-contextual.

• They think strongly in first-degree relations: if A, then B.
• This has advantages for a company: goal orientation, efficiency, clear decisions.
• At the same time, it has limitations: less sense of nuance, less perspective-taking, and a higher chance of misunderstandings in human relationships.

Coping mechanisms

A boss often develops coping strategies to deal with complex situations.

• He/she is usually unaware that these strategies mainly solve short-term problems but can be harmful to the team climate in the long run.
• Examples: excessive checking, avoiding emotional conversations, or making authoritarian decisions to compensate for insecurity.

What does this mean for you?

• The behavior does not necessarily stem from "malice" or a personality disorder, but can be understood as a thinking style with both strengths and weaknesses.
• The label "narcissist" can be stigmatizing and sometimes obscures the real dynamics of context sensitivity.

Practical advice

• Communicate concretely and clearly. Avoid implicit hints or vague suggestions; explain what you mean.
• Acknowledge the strengths. Point out your boss’s efficiency or result orientation; this builds trust.
• Protect your own boundaries. Don’t get drawn into excessive caretaking.
• Add context where possible. Introduce nuance in conversations, offer alternative perspectives, and do this calmly and factually.
• Seek support. Discuss situations with colleagues or a trusted advisor, so you don’t get overburdened yourself.

Conclusion

Not every difficult boss is a "narcissist". More often it’s a case of low-contextual thinking: strong in clarity and action, but vulnerable to tunnel vision and relational misunderstandings. Understanding this allows you to align better, set more realistic expectations, and work together more constructively.

People with autism don’t lie, do they?

Many people see honesty as a typical feature of autism. It is true that people with autism often communicate literally and directly, but that doesn’t mean they never hide or adapt the truth. What matters is understanding why they do it.

Context blindness and truth

Autism is often associated with context blindness — difficulty in grasping situations within their broader context. While others spontaneously take into account subtle cues (the right nuance, the right timing), a person with autism tends to focus mainly on factual accuracy or immediate outcomes.

• For them, "truth" is something concrete — what is literally seen or thought.
• As a result, statements that are factually correct may be socially inappropriate.
• Conversely, withholding or adjusting information may feel like a way to maintain peace, not necessarily as deceit.

Transactional and egocentric thinking

When a person with autism "lies", it is often not out of malicious manipulation, but rather as a form of transactional behavior or egocentric thinking. The behavior can have a manipulative effect — it influences how others respond — but the underlying intent is usually practical or protective, not calculated.

So, is that lying?

Lying implies an intention to deceive and an awareness of its consequences. People with autism often lack that second component: they have limited awareness of broader context and long-term consequences. The behavior is therefore more a result of limited context integration than of moral unwillingness or a lack of honesty.

What helps in communication

• Ask clarifying questions instead of judging.
• Explain explicitly why truth or openness matters in that situation.
• Highlight consequences in both the short and long term, making context more visible.
• Acknowledge that "truth" has different layers — factual, social, and emotional.

Conclusion

People with autism may consciously adjust the truth to elicit a desired reaction or avoid tension — that is, in a sense, manipulation, but not of the calculated or malicious kind. It is a short-term strategy arising from limited contextual insight and a need for order or predictability. Understanding this can help reduce misunderstandings and rebuild trust.

Jonas — attention, context and ADHD at work

In meetings, Jonas loses the thread as soon as someone takes a tangent. Not because he is uninterested — far from it. Every detail draws his attention equally: a colleague's remark, the sound of the air conditioning, a thought that suddenly comes to mind. For Jonas, all those stimuli have the same value. His brain does not automatically filter what is relevant right now.

At his desk it is no different. He opens a task, spots an email in the meantime, follows a link, and half an hour later he is reading something completely unrelated to his work. The original task is still open — not out of carelessness, but because every new signal felt just as urgent as the previous one.

His manager sees someone who "doesn't know his priorities". Jonas experiences someone who sees everything, but struggles to choose what matters now — because context does not tell him automatically.

What is actually happening?

Attention regulation is a form of context processing: the ability to determine what is relevant in this situation, at this moment, for this goal. In ADHD, that context filter works differently — not less, but differently.

Research into proactive and reactive control makes this concrete. Proactive control is maintaining context over time. Reactive control is adjusting when the situation changes. In ADHD, both are disrupted, and they do not correlate as they do in others. Someone who can plan well can still be completely thrown off when something changes unexpectedly.

That is not a lack of intelligence or effort. It is a difference in how the brain weighs and prioritises stimuli — precisely the core of what context sensitivity describes.

Connection with autism

ADHD and autism are not the same, but share a common vulnerability layer: attention control as a context filter. In autism, the implicit construction of contextual meaning is laborious. In ADHD, the selection of relevant stimuli is unstable. Two paths to the same problem: the world does not automatically indicate what matters now.

What helps?

Because the problem lies in context processing — and not in motivation or character — it helps to adapt the environment and communication accordingly.

For the individual:

• Make context explicit. Write down at the start of a task why it matters right now. This activates proactive control that would otherwise not engage automatically.
• Use external structure as a context anchor. Time blocks, timers and fixed routines are not workarounds — they replace the context filter that is less stable internally.
• Acknowledge variable capacity. High pressure can temporarily create focus. That is not proof it is always possible — it is a different mode of the same system.

For managers:

• Provide context with assignments. Not only what needs to happen, but why it matters now and how it connects to the bigger picture.
• Distinguish will from can. Someone who experiences everything as equally urgent does not lack motivation — they have a different context filter. That calls for adjustments to the environment, not only to the person.
• Avoid open-ended deadlines. Vague deadlines disappear. Concrete moments — "Friday before lunch" — give the system an anchor.

For practitioners:

• Examine the work environment, not only the behaviour. Complaints at work are often a mismatch between context processing and environmental demands — not merely a symptom of the individual.
• Frame proactive and reactive control separately. Someone can be strong at planning but collapse when unexpected changes arise — or vice versa. That asymmetry is clinically relevant.
• Start from the functional profile, not the label. What are the concrete situations where context processing breaks down? What maintains it? What are the strengths? Those questions guide the plan better than a classification.

Conclusion

Jonas does not have a priority problem. He has a context filter that works differently. That distinction — between wanting and being able, between character and cognition — is precisely where understanding begins. And where meaningful adaptation becomes possible.