I definitely agree that explicit study would come more naturally to an autistic person. It'd be interesting to see which sorts of cases the two groups would make errors in, and compare explicit study done by autistic and neurotypical subjects.

As an aside, to me, (some kinds of) sexual interest seems to feel like a "vibration" or "pressure", but does direct my attention (if desired) to more specific signs. I'd guess that part of the signal is extremely difficult to consciously access (scent, subtle prosodics).