I have also noticed this ability-to-react for several years. I am definitely good at it. Unfortunately, I cannot offer any advice on developing the skill, but I do have some observations:

-I tend to get nervous after doing something. For instance, when presenting to a large group, I feel completely calm. Afterward, however, I often start shaking as I go over it in my head.

-Regarding public speaking, I don't generally need to write out what I'm going to say, but I do need to think it out in advance. Usually, I have a 5-10 line summary for a 10 minute presentation. Otherwise, I ramble.

-This skill is especially useful in dancing. I dance blues, salsa, and some swing socially. I almost never plan out moves; dance partners have asked me many times what that cool move was, and I have no idea. Apparently this is very unusual. The flip side is that I cannot dance pre-choreographed moves at all. Usually I forget the sequence within 3 measures and just do something else.

-I also love simulations like those you mentioned. We used to do emergency simulations in the Scouts, and I felt very in-my-element. I just go into this alert problem-solving mode and everything seems to flow smoothly. It feels great.

Two hypotheses:

• Is this skill related to left/right brain dominance? I believe my ability-to-act is unusually good, and I know that I am extremely right brained. Intuitively, this ability-to-act sounds like a right-brain skill. Any other observations for/against this hypothesis?

• I would bet money under long odds that this skill correlates closely with parallel thinking. Parallel thinking is the ability to consider multiple approaches to a problem simultaneously; I do it constantly. If you've ever looked at a problem,immediately seen three ways of doing it, estimated the difficulty of each, and gone with the best, that's parallel thinking. When I'm in ability-to-act mode, it becomes a subconscious process. Any one else want to submit evidence for or against for this one?