Rethinking Frontline Responses to Sexualized Acts in Neurodivergent Individuals
By Kate E. Reynolds, CF, BSc (Hons) SA, PGDHEd, PGDC, MScDS, RGN
This piece by Kate E. Reynolds explores the ways that frontline carers and family of neurodivergent people can go wrong when it comes to responding to sexualised acts. Her book How to Respond to Sexualised Acts is out now.
Attitudes
Attitudes underpin much of the work around sexuality and disability. They can influence the level of relationships and sexuality education that’s delivered, sociosexual opportunities that neurodivergent Individuals are enabled to experience, as well as general perceptions of neurodivergent intimate relationships. Throughout the book, I focus on attitudes and cultures that might form the backdrop to sexualized acts, that might influence responses to sexualized acts and can undermine the promotion of neurodivergent Individuals expressing sexuality in healthy and legal ways.
Some key attitudinal points outlined in the book are:
- An acceptance or hope by parents that their children/young people’s actions will ‘normalize’ over time without explicit teaching
- Parents lack knowledge and skills surrounding relationships and sexuality, even when they are confident in other areas of supporting their children/young people
- Disability can frame the self-perception of parents as carers and seems to prevent some from enabling their children/young people to achieve independence, by instilling social boundaries in the home and facilitating children/young people to practise and manage activities of daily living
- Frontline staff often individualise relationship and sexuality teaching, leaving it open to subjective interpretations of what is ‘appropriate’ for that pupil to learn
- Some frontline staff accept sexualized acts and/or erroneously divert the individual to toilets or quiet rooms for them to be sexual alone
- Some frontline staff consider all intimate relationships and sexuality to be ‘inappropriate’ depending on the level of perceived intellect of the individual
- Many frontline staff feel ill-equipped to deal with sexualized acts, due to lack of training and resources. This leads to erratic, idiosyncratic responses that can be confusing for pupils/residents
Why use the term ‘sexualized acts’?
Initially I used the words ‘sexualized behaviour’. However, the interviews and review of the literature, including testimony from autistic people, undermined the term ‘behaviour’ which was described as ‘triggering’. So I’ve used the term sexualized acts and only used ‘behaviour’ advisedly throughout the book.
I describe the many varied actions that come under the umbrella of sexualized acts, from non-contact, to contact and technology-assisted acts.
The causes of sexualized acts are broad. I contrast the main causes for neurotypical as opposed to neurodivergent individuals to tease out the way forward for prevention.
The research
This book involved a very long journey of reviewing, rewriting and learning. Initially, I gorged on 325 references which formed my literature review and analysed anonymized questionnaires from two large autism schools and a specialist college. But it was when I conducted interviews with experts from Australia New Zealand and the United states, funded by the Churchill fellowship, that I found myself reviewing everything I’d written to date and understanding why I felt extremely uncomfortable with a lot of the research and practise in this field.
The structure of the book
There’s an Easy Read summary at the end of each chapter as well as numerous visuals, such as flow charts, to increase the accessibility of the text. In addition, there are quotes from interviews which add texture and break up the text for readers. There are also several teaching exercises for frontline staff in the appendices.
The Focus of the book is on sexualized acts in public parts of the home or in public places, such as schools, colleges and residential settings. If such acts are allowed to continue, the police or psychiatric services will become involved, so my aim is to explore how to enable parents and frontline staff to support children and young people to learn about relationships, sexuality and where and when individuals can safely and legally be sexual. Ultimately, the goal is to prevent sexualized acts from developing further and reduce or eliminate them.
It is incredibly difficult to find information that covers the period when sexualized acts first occur. Parents frequently are reluctant to seek help, while many professionals accept their pupils/clients being sexual as ‘part of the job,’ both of which cause a gap in understanding of the challenges a child/young person may face until their sexualized acts are established and chronic.
The proposal
In conclusion I suggest a wide-ranging proposal that:
- We rethink our approach, education and support offered, so that neurodivergent individuals are taught and engaged with prior to and from the first instance of sexualized acts.
- We reexamine the management, pay and training for frontline staff and, crucially, attitudes in any form of residential institution and educational establishments.
- We examine the foundation of residential accommodation for neurodivergent people, not just regarding how it impacts the possibility of relationships, but the general philosophy, function, management and, essentially, the regulation of these institutions.
Kate E. Reynolds is a former NHS Clinical Nurse Specialist and counsellor with 18 years’ experience, including seven in sexual health and HIV/AIDS, turned to writing after her son was diagnosed with autism and learning disabilities in 2005. She is now an author, researcher, and public speaker on sexuality education and disability, and has presented at events including a UK Parliamentary Group meeting.