Different Perspective on Autism-Oriented Research

In the newly published paper Intercultural Cognitive Pragmatics as a tool for understanding autism Dr. Daniel Żuromski and Prof. Anita Pacholik-Żuromska suggest a method that might help reorient research in a new way

In the article, scientists argue that the currently dominant ToM-based narratives in autism research are becoming more and more insufficient, not only theoretically but also ethically. They advocate for a change in the perspective of autism; they want its definition changed from ” deviation ” to „variation in how minds are shaped,” acknowledging social and cultural impacts.

Therefore, they introduce an Intercultural Cognitive Pragmatics which:

offers an approach for reorienting research
and practice toward mutual intelligibility, participatory scaffolding,
and contextual adaptation rather than individual correction.

This tool could create a new way of approaching research on autism. Scientists realized not only the inefficiency of previous research but also took into account that the problems in communication are not always due to deficiencies in social skills of autistic individuals but to differences in communication norms.

Changing the narrative might change the approach towards autistic people as tested objects . Also, acknowledging reasons why communication between autistic and non-autistic individuals, as well as between autistic individuals, differs and taking into account the impact that social and cultural experiences have on shaping one’s mind might help modernize future studies.

Check out the full article in Frontiers in Human Neuroscience:

Frontiers | Intercultural Cognitive Pragmatics as a tool for understanding autism