Beyond Norms: Unleashing Autistic Flourishing

Autistic individuals can thrive and succeed beyond societal norms or normative expectations of neurotypicals.

In their recent article “Autistic Flourishing”, Michelle Garnett and Tony Attwood argue that there can be an autistic model to a flourishing life. Such a model can be directly fed by data from speaking and non-speaking autistic individuals (the latter including, by necessity, secondary data from families/ caregivers), thus giving “voice” to us, autistics. Such a model would also redirect research and intervention — whose status quo is to reduce or eliminate autistic traits — to focus not on changing autistic individuals per neurotypical expectations, but promoting autistic individualities, aspirations, and goals.

AI-generated image of a sense of thriving lives (curious dove with three wings, but sure)

Autistic individuals were interviewed in various countries and the following themes were identified:

1. Autism awareness & acceptance — the world needs to be aware and accepting of us;
2. The difficulty certain traits, like honesty, pose in a world built for neurotypicals;
3. Ability to be autonomous by embracing the identity;
4. Little interest in friendship or social engagement, which were viewed as exhausting (having Social Anxiety Disorder on top of being autistic, I can definitely attest to this!)

Garnett & Attwood applied Philosopher Martha Nussmbaum’s capability-based model of a thriving life on the autistic model to demonstrate that we have the potential to flourish with dignity and well-being, given the 10 essential capabilities of Nussmbaum’s framework.

Therefore, argue Garnett & Attwood legitimately, research should focus on the autistic quality of life by leveraging data collected from autistic individuals and their families/ caregivers, rather than by neurotypical perspectives much espoused by the medical model and the society at large.

Focusing research on “acceptance without trying to ‘fix’ or change autistic characteristics unless a characteristic impedes their quality of life” is a key recommendation of the autistic model. Furthermore, training professionals (doctors, teachers, counselors, etc.) in neurodiversity and building sensory-friendly environments while embracing capabilities of autistic individuals are additional streams of work our societies should pursue.

Feel free to connect with me: https://linktr.ee/undaautistica.