Examples of masking can include, but are not limited to: Mimicking the social behaviour of others, including gestures or facial expressions. Deliberately forcing or faking eye contact during conversations. Hiding or underplaying their own intense interests.
Masking describes the act of hiding or suppressing symptoms of a mental health condition. People usually mask in situations and environments where they are expected to act in a socially normative way — like at school or work, or when meeting new people.
What Is Masking In Psychology? Presenting a certain face to the world is something that most people are familiar with. For example, when you have a day you are feeling a bit off colour and yet you smile and say you are fine when someone asks.
Mental health masking means camouflaging or suppressing your mental health symptoms so you fit in with others. People mask their mental health symptoms because they want to maintain their relationships, keep their jobs, and be socially accepted.
Ultimately, masking or camouflage means hiding who you are in order to fit in. When you experience trauma and/or rejection for being who you truly are, it's common to think you need to hide these traits to survive. After all, bad things have happened when you didn't.
Autism masking, also known as Autism camouflaging, follows the same lines….. Masking is a word used to describe something seen in many children with ASD – when they learn, practice, and perform certain behaviours and suppress others in order to be more like the people around them.
Signs of Masking
If you notice that you tend to look to others before deciding what to do in various situations, you might be masking by mimicking their behavior. If you do not feel like these choices come naturally to you, and you instead try to copy what you see, you might be masking your social behavior.
ADHD masking may also be called "camouflaging." This is when someone with ADHD tries to cover up their symptoms by copying the behaviors of people who don't have it. ADHD masking may be a way for some people with ADHD to fit in socially, avoid being stigmatized, or feel more accepted.
If you hide your adult ADHD symptoms from other people, that's called masking. Basically, you're trying to seem more “normal” or “regular.” ADHD causes some people to act hyperactive or impulsive. It makes other folks have trouble paying attention. And still other adults have a combination of those symptoms.
Some people become anxious when wearing a face mask or just thinking about wearing a face mask. This would be what some are calling face mask anxiety. But it is important to remember that the mask is NOT causing the anxiety. The person's perceptions about the mask are what lead the brain to become anxious.
All children are different, but if they change character when they go from school to home, or go into meltdown, or appear exhausted, it might be a sign that they are masking in public.
Masking may involve suppressing certain behaviours we find soothing but that others think are 'weird', such as stimming or intense interests. It can also mean mimicking the behaviour of those around us, such as copying non-verbal behaviours, and developing complex social scripts to get by in social situations.
Some people with quiet BPD can hide their condition and appear successful, independent, and overall high functioning. You might be able to hold a job during the day, but crash into a depressive, anxious, or dissociative state when the day is over. Think of quiet BPD as a mask.
The people-pleasing mask
If you wear a people-pleasing mask, your self-esteem depends on the acceptance from others. You may often go out of your way to make sure other people around you are happy. Making others happy gives you a sense of self-worth.
Put simply; masking is intentionally shifting your behavior to hide your differences. For example, a woman with ADHD might smile and nod during a conversation even though she tuned out long ago, or she may secretly work late into the night to overcompensate for not staying on task for a deadline.
High IQ may “mask” the diagnosis of ADHD by compensating for deficits in executive functions in treatment-naïve adults with ADHD.
Meltdowns are a physical reaction to overstimulation surrounding auditory overload, visual overload, and sensory overload in general. Meltdowns can also occur from the extreme exhaustion that comes from masking.
Masking can be a behavior individuals adopt subconsciously as coping mechanisms or a trauma response, or it can be a conscious behavior an individual adopts to fit in within perceived societal norms. Masking is interconnected with maintaining performative behavior within social structures and cultures.
Even though the anxiety associated with masking may not necessarily rise to the level of a formal diagnosis of social anxiety disorder, this type of social anxiety can be distressing enough to impact the way you feel about your choices and yourself. “This worry about others' opinions of us is a form of social anxiety.”
The mental and emotional energy it takes to mask often results in an unleashing of pent up emotions when back in their safe place, most often at home. This is known as the coke bottle effect.
We found that masking is not limited to autistic people, which is consistent with theory on identity and stigma management. However, some aspects of masking appear to be specific to the autistic experience (i.e., suppressing stims).
Neurodivergent masking refers to the practice of concealing or suppressing aspects of one's neurodivergent traits or conditions, in order to fit in with the norms of the workplace or society.