Abstract. Some people with autism try to hide aspects of their autism or develop ways to cope with it. This is known as camouflaging. Camouflaging involves finding ways around things that an autistic person finds difficult, hiding aspects of their autism, and trying to fit in with others.
It is used to identify individuals who compensate for or mask autistic characteristics during social interactions and who might not immediately present with autistic traits due to their ability to mask. This can be especially relevant for women with Autism.
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.
Masking, also known as camouflaging, in its most basic form is covering up our traits and behaviours in order to fit in, and/or to take on behaviours deemed as more socially acceptable or advantageous.
Camouflage, also called cryptic coloration, is a defense mechanism or tactic that organisms use to disguise their appearance, usually to blend in with their surroundings. Organisms use camouflage to mask their location, identity, and movement.
Over time we may become more aware of our own masking, but it often begins as an unconscious response to social trauma before we even grasp our differences. I was 23 when I received my autism diagnosis, and it was only through learning more about masking that I realised how my diagnosis had been hidden for so long.
It's critical to understand what's going on because camouflaging is associated with many adverse outcomes in autistic individuals, like higher anxiety and depression. We are seeing studies that show masking in girls as young as 7 or 8 years old on the school playground.
There are four basic types of camouflage: concealing coloration, disruptive coloration, disguise and mimicry.
Disguise involves the appearance change of an animal to make it blend with its surroundings. Mimicry is when animals mimic other animals to fool their prey or predators. Examples of some animals that camouflage are zebras, viceroy butterflies, stick bugs, and snowshoe hares.
To be diagnosed with autism, a person has to have a lot of autistic traits from birth, and those traits need to have a big effect on their life. In order to be diagnosed with autism, those traits must cause what a healthcare professional would call 'clinically significant difficulties' in their day-to-day life.
They are one and the same. The Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is the clinical definition for autism. Some people chose to be referred to as “an autistic person”, while others prefer to be referred to “a person with autism”.
Some developmental health professionals refer to PDD-NOS as “subthreshold autism." In other words, it's the diagnosis they use for someone who has some but not all characteristics of autism or who has relatively mild symptoms.
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.
What are 'masking' and 'camouflaging' in the context of autism and ADHD? Many autistic people and ADHD-ers report using “masking” and “camouflaging” in their lives. This is where people conceal certain traits and replace them with neurotypical ones to avoid being recognised as neurominorities.
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).
While ADHD can make it difficult to focus, sit still, or control impulses, autism can limit a person's scope of interests or affect social skills and learning abilities. ADHD and autism often share symptoms, like difficulty communicating or concentrating. Additionally, it's possible that the conditions are connected.
It's something you're born with. Signs of autism might be noticed when you're very young, or not until you're older. If you're autistic, you're autistic your whole life. Autism is not a medical condition with treatments or a "cure".
People with ADHD will often develop a “mask” that they wear in certain situations, such as at work, which camouflage the most visible traits of the disorder. For example, they might avoid repetitive motions like leg bouncing or pen clicking because they might annoy other people.