Neurodiversity-affirming research and practice workshop

This workshop defines key terms related to the neurodiversity movement, introduces attendees to core principles of neurodiversity-affirming practice, and outlines minority stress theory as it applies to neuro minorities. This workshop will also signpost how attendees may augment their existing ways of working to better meet the needs of their neurodivergent clients/participants with reference to healthy selfing, attuned unmasking, and outcome measures.

“What we risk doing with support and interventions is just filling people's jugs up further with more things to remember, more demands, more stressors” - @heasutherland

Neurodiversity

Given that no two brains are alike and there's no "right" way of being, the neurodiversity movement calls for embracing and celebrating diversity. The neurodiversity movement further challenges professionals to set aside outdated conceptualisations and assumptions of neurodivergent people's experiences (e.g., based on the medical model of disability) and to instead include the environment in their analyses.

Despite its compatibility with contextual behavioural science (CBS), many professionals have yet to explore neurodiversity-affirming research and practice. In part, this may be due to its novel terminology (e.g., neuronormalised, neurominoritized, etc.) and misuses of this terminology (e.g., neurodiverse is intended to describe a group of people, not an individual).

Another reason the neurodiversity movement may be overlooked is that it tends to be misunderstood. More specifically, people sometimes frame the movement as incompatible with ACT because it describes "diagnostic labels" as key components of people's identities or can be presented as "anti-ABA". And yet, the neurodiversity movement has so much to offer ACT (and CBS more broadly!)

Book your place

This workshop costs just £10, and you can register here at Eventbrite.