Competing Sensations! A common sensory processing problem, for many on the spectrum, is poor integration of all the senses. For people with good sensory integration, they easily integrate all their senses simultaneously together into one overall perception. For some individuals these different sensations (vision, auditory, touch, smell, vestibular, etc.) do not integrate into one comprehensive perception. As you can imagine, if all the sounds, sights, smells, touch, etc. do not synchronized into one perception, they will be competing with one another for attention. Consequently, the bombardment of competing senses can be very distracting and overwhelming. Many individuals on the spectrum, who have problems with integrating their senses, will favor one sense over others as their primary method for making sense of the world. This is call “mono-processing”. For some it may be vision, for others hearing, and others touch, taste, or smell. For these individuals, if the other senses are bombarding them with competing sensations, they cannot filter out the sensations, and will become overwhelmed. They may try to block out other competing sensations in order to focus on their preferred sense. For example, if the child uses vision as the primary sense, he may cover his ears to block out auditory stimulation, if it is competing with his vision. Often we may misinterpret this as the child being auditory defensive, when he is really just trying to block out one sense (hearing) to focus on his preferred sense (vision). Neurotypical (NT) people integrate all of their senses simultaneously and subconsciously with minimal effort. However, for those on the spectrum who cannot integrate their senses, they have to piece each competing sense together sequentially, at the conscious level (think it through). They have to consciously “make sense” out of the competing senses that we process with ease. This takes a lot of mental energy, and easily taxes the brain. As you can imagine, the more sensory “noisy” (combination of all sensations) the environment is, the more taxing and overwhelming it would be to process. Sensory overload is a major problem for many on the spectrum. With all the artificial lights, noises, smells, and textures in our environment, they often tax and overwhelm the nervous system. So, be very cognizant of how much sensory information we are bombarding the children with when engaging them throughout the day. Try and identify if they have a preferred sense. If they do, try to use that sense to teach, relate, and engage around. Try to make that sense stand out, while minimizing the amount of other distracting sensory information. Try to turn down, modify, or mask the other competing stimulation. If your child is primarily a visual processor, you may want to give them ear plugs when entering into a noisy setting. This will help them filter out the competing noise, so they can better use their vision. If he starts to get agitated for no apparent reason, there is a good chance he may be experiencing overload from the sensory bombardment around him. Try to turn it down, or allow the child to pull back to regroup. If the child has sensory integration problems, we have to be very respectful of this vulnerability. Sensory overload will quickly set off the “fight or flight”, panic response. It represents a major threat to the nervous system, and must be treated immediately by removing the stimulation until the nervous system has a chance to regroup and rebound. The more aware we are of this vulnerability, the greater we can adapt the environment to be more sensory friendly for your children.
Posted on: Fri, 15 Aug 2014 02:15:09 +0000
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