Autism and Nature-Connection
2nd April 2022
Autism Awareness week is a yearly event that is planned around Autism Awareness Day on the 2nd of April. In 2022, Autism Awareness Week runs from 29 March - 4 April.
Autism is a 'neurodifference' that affects the way that people process information and how they perceive and interact with the world around them. People with autism may appear socially awkward, distant or aloof. They often experience difficulties with making and maintaining relationships. They may have difficulties understanding and relating to other people and social situations and this can lead to frustration, anxiety or social isolation.
Benefits of Nature Connection for People with an Autistic Spectrum Condition
There has been comparatively little research into nature-connection and autism, especially compared to that undertaken into how exposure to nature can reduce symptoms of other neurodevelopmental problems such as Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). Research has shown that children with ADHD who take walks or play in green spaces show more elevated attention and concentration spans that children with ADHD who take walks in built-up environments or predominantly play in indoor settings. There is quite a high co-existence of ADHD and autism and so it seems reasonable to conclude that increased nature connection will be beneficial at least in this scenario.
Many people with autism also experience either hypersensitivity (over-sensitivity) or hyposensitivity (under-sensitivity) to sensory experiences such as hearing, tasting, smelling, touching and feeling and sights. Taking people with autism who are over-sensitive outside and inviting them to connect with nature through sight, sound and touch can enhance their ability to cope with a wider range of stimuli and reduce their experiences of sensory problems. For those who are under-sensitive, walks in nature with a focus on the sights, sounds and smells or nature can increase their sensory stimulation in these areas. Recent research has proposed that some of the associated sensory processing problems experienced can be attributed to inefficient neural pathways, but by experiencing a variety of different sensory inputs, such as hearing, touching and seeing in a natural environment, these neural pathways can be strengthened. It is worth noting that people with autism may be over-sensitive to some sensory experiences, for example sounds or sights and visual input, but under-sensitive to other sensory experiences, such a touch and feeling.
There is also a lot of research into the beneficial effects of nature-connection on anxiety and depression levels, and as this Mind report describes, over 70% of people with autism experience depression and severe anxiety in comparison to about 25% of the general population who would be likely to develop mental health issues during their lifetime.
Autistic Children and Nature Connection
The hormone oxytocin is responsible for emotional bonding and feelings of wellbeing and calm. Research has suggested that children with autism often have lower levels of oxytocin, but contact with plants and animals has been shown to increase oxytocin production, and this may be one of the reasons that animal-assisted interventions are often very successful when working with people on the spectrum. This may be equally true for nature-connection activities too.
One of the more in-depth studies of autism and nature connection showed that when children with autism were regularly engaged in outdoor activities, they experienced improvements in seven key areas: social interaction; communication; behaviour; emotion; cognition; sensory issues; and physical activity. The benefits most frequently encountered were improvements to a child’s emotional state and increases in their cognitive ability.
A teacher interviewed in a Natural England Report stated:
What I have found working with autistic children is that they just are different when you take them into nature, to how they are in a classroom. When we are in school, it’s very contrived, and they know they will have to do things that they may not be very comfortable about doing, but when they go into nature e.g. woods or fields I think they feel much more relaxed, they seem to understand the environment, they feel more comfortable – maybe because they are much freer to roam and explore, and to be involved in the sensory aspects of nature.
Most other interviewees in the study also considered personal well-being as one of the primary benefits for autistic children of engaging with the natural environment including: helping them to relax, feel more comfortable with their surroundings and have heightened sensory experiences; and the concluded that this was generally associated with the development of social skills.
Theoretical Frameworks Supporting Nature Connection Benefits
We discussed in a previous post the theories of nature connection, and there is a robust theoretical foundation that supports the benefits of nature-connection in the general public, but also in neurodiverse populations. Kaplan and Kaplan’s Attention Restoration Theory (ART) states that directed attention, the ability to focus on cognitively-demanding tasks, critical to high-level cognitive functioning and behavioural regulation, fatigues with use but can be restored through exposure to nature. For many children and adults with autism, difficulties in focusing on tasks, especially those outside of their specific interests, and emotional regulation can be problematic. Attention Restoration Theory proposes that exposure to nature can restore abilities around attention and focus and enhance cognitive functioning and behavioural performance. Likewise, Ulrich’s Stress Recovery Theory (SRT) proposes that when people are psychologically or physically stressed, then exposure to unthreatening natural environments will reduce stress and have a restorative effect. As previously mentioned, people with autism are more prone to experiencing depression and anxiety, as well as emotion-related difficulties such as autistic meltdowns. It is therefore hypothesised that exposure to nature can have the same kind of beneficial effect on people with autism too.
Barriers to Nature Connection in People with Autistic Spectrum Conditions
As discussed earlier in this article, people with autism may experience different reactions to sensory stimuli than neurotypical (non-autistic) people and as such may not find natural environments beneficial. For example some people with autism find wooded areas with dense canopies harder to deal with.
Additionally, whilst some people with autism do not experience cognitive impairments, a significant number of people with an ASC experience co-existing learning disabilities or cognitive impairments that could make the more mindfulness-based nature-connection activities such as Forest Bathing or Silvotherapy harder to understand and engage with.
If you would like to learn more about the importance of terminology, then read this article on “A Shift from Autism Acceptance to Appreciation”.
If you are autistic or neurodiverse and interested in collaborating with me on further research and writing about neurodiversity and nature connection, please get in touch by emailing me at hugh@silvotherapy.co.uk.
