Intense interests and repetitive behaviour’
Strong passions and repeated actions can bring joy to autistic individuals and serve as a means of dealing with daily challenges. However, these pursuits might transform into fixations that restrict engagement in other tasks, which can make them feel upset or worried. Learn how you can support them in these situations.
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“My mind was constantly whirring with thoughts, worries and concerns. The time spent with my intense interest was the only time in which I had a clear mind – it gave me that much sought-after relaxation.”
Autistic young person
Highly focused, intense interests
Many autistic people have highly focused, intense or passionate interests in an area or topic that may start from a young age and stay the same or change over time. Some people may refer to these as ‘special interests’ but not all autistic people like or use this term. While many autistic young children like trains or dinosaurs, these are common stereotypes. Their interests can be anything – an object, place, person, animal or activity. They may collect items related to their interests and acquire extensive knowledge about their interests.
For many autistic people, the ability to engage and pursue their interests is important for their wellbeing. They provide a sense of structure, order and predictability in coping with the uncertainties of everyday life. These interests may be channeled into their studies, turn into a career, and help them develop confidence in social situations. In essence, these intense interests are experienced as positive, comforting, and enjoyable to the autistic person.
Stimming or repetitive movement and behaviour
Repetitive or self-stimulatory behaviour, also known as stimming may include arm or hand-flapping, tapping with fingers, rocking, jumping, spinning, twirling, pacing, repeatedly touching, twiddling hair or repeating words. Some repetitive behaviour can be self-injurious such as head banging. These repetitive behaviors are often used to help regulate and express emotions. They may serve as adaptive coping skills to gain or reduce sensory input and to cope with stress and anxiety.
Distinguishing intense interests from obsessive compulsion
Autistic behaviour, in particular, their highly focused, intense interests or repetitive behaviours can appear similar to obsessive compulsive behaviours associated with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD), while repetitive movements such as tapping, counting and checking etc. may be a compulsion or a stim. Often, people misinterpret autistic routines, passionate interests and stimming as obsessive compulsive behaviours in OCD. It is important to distinguish the two because the underlying reasons for these behaviours are different.
Obsessions are persistent, unwanted and intrusive thoughts, images, urges that could cause anxiety and distress, affecting a person’s day-to-day function. These obsessions induce compulsive behaviours by compelling the person to perform and carry out certain repetitive and ritualistic behaviours to reduce the anxiety caused by the obsession. OCD is a type of anxiety disorder that can cause significant distress and severely impact daily life. In the case of OCD, the compulsions are carried out to reduce the anxiety caused by the obsession and are fuelled by fear or distress. In the case of intense interest or stimming in autism, an autistic person engaging in their interests or stimming behaviour feels calm, relax and joy. They may become distressed if they are not able to engage in their interest or stim, but the distress is not caused by the intense interest and stimming as such. The difference between the two is that obsessive thoughts and compulsions related to OCD are negative and not helpful whereas autistic interests, routines and rituals provides consistency and predictability, helps to reduce anxiety and is experienced as positive by the autistic person.
These interests are a useful source of coping or regulation to help autistic people cope with the stressful demands of reality.
Strategies
Understand the function of the behaviour
Before addressing a repetitive behaviour or interest, ask yourself if those behaviours are causing anxiety and distress to the autistic person and negatively impacting their lives. If those behaviours do not cause harm or discomfort to the individual and does not violate others’ rights, it is important to allow them the time and space to engage in their interests, which helps them to cope and regulate with the stressful demands of reality. To reduce or change non-harmful behaviours that autistic people find helpful could be harmful and detrimental to their wellbeing.
We can prepare a range of enjoyable, calming or sensory friendly activities or space for the person if they seem stressed or anxious.
We can make use of visual supports such as social stories, or pre-plan strategies to prepare for transitions, changes or events that might cause stress. Time timers can be helpful for planning and in presenting abstract concepts like time.
Many autistic people have difficulty identifying, understanding and describing how they are feeling. This is known as alexithymia. We can help them to identify when they are feeling stressed or anxious and learn alternative strategies to relieve their stress and anxiety. For example, we can make use of visual strategies such as a traffic light system, visual thermometer or a scale to present emotions in colours or numbers (a green traffic light or a scale of 1 can indicate calm, a red traffic light or a scale of 5 can indicate angry). We can also teach them relaxation techniques such as taking deep breaths or provide them with stress-relieving toys. For those who need support to communicate, we can make use of cards or notes to help them convey their needs.
If necessary, set clear, consistent limits – for example, ration the amount of time or place where the person engage in the behaviour. Decide on a realistic target together. It is important to start small and proceed incrementally by setting small realistic goals to help build confidence. Consider what needs to be changed – if they are unable to stop doing an activity, try reducing the time spent on it. If they are constantly doing the activity while trying to focus on other things, try reducing the frequency. If it is a mixture of both, focus on one aspect first and proceed incrementally.
It may be useful to think of and provide alternative activities or ways for the person to express or engage in their interests. For example, in addition to talking about their interest, they could also record their thoughts down on their phone or in a book. It might also be possible for the person to join a club or group that is related to their interests.
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