Socializing feels like work to me. Conversation is not entertainment, it is work.
I actually ended up in a few work conflicts over this. I’m a woman in IT, but I’m very much the introverted nerd. I mastered shop floor data management and product data management systems as an engineer and moved into user support because I was already doing that ... better than the people on the help desk. No programming experience, but I don’t need it, either.
I had people mad at me that I didn’t “hang out” and socialize the way they expect. I could talk to people and sometimes did socially. But I didn’t specifically attach to coworkers because I changed jobs every few years, even if it was an internal transfer.
I had people lecture me for not going out for drinks. I don’t drink and have kids at home. I was criticized for not hanging out with the admins, though I knew that being mistake for an admin hurt me professionally. Ended up with professional consequences for refusing to go to lunch/drinks/dinner with a dude in a dress because he wanted to “hang out as girls” and I said it was inappropriate for me as a woman to go to one-on-one event with a man at work. Yeah, people don’t like hearing the truth.
That said, I’m not ANTI social. I’m married with children. I volunteer and deal with my kids’ friends in addition to work and my own family.
I also know that any EQ test is going to flag me as unsuitable though I’ve literally written the manual, helpdesk scripts and user training for several applications and GAVE user training to thousands. All because I don’t have the happy, bubbly love of people that they think is necessary for such a role or “normal”.