Sensory Street, 2021

MacLennan, Keren and Woolley, Catherine and @21andsensory, Emily and Heasman, Brett and Starns, Jess and George, Becky and Manning, Catherine (2022). Sensory Street, 2021. [Data Collection]. Colchester, Essex: UK Data Service. 10.5255/UKDA-SN-855801

While members of the autism community are all too aware of the importance of sensory processing differences, people without autism-specific training or expertise may be unaware of the effects that sensory processing differences have on daily life. Sensory processing differences are part of what make the world disabling for autistic people, impacting family life, education and mental health. Yet to date nobody has created a holistic immersive installation to illustrate what a more enabling world could look like for autistic people. This project uses the power of experience to inform people who come into day-to-day contact with autistic people about sensory processing differences. People will experience an immersive ‘Sensory Street’ where shops, hairdressers and leisure places are transformed into sensory experiences based on descriptions of difficulties faced by autistic individuals. A critical first step is to work with autistic individuals to hear which aspects of different environments most affect them and which audiences they would most like to be informed about their sensory needs.

In this research study, co-designed with autistic individuals, we investigated the sensory experiences of autistic adults in public spaces. We used an online focus group method, recruiting 24 autistic adults across 7 focus groups to collect qualitative data.

Data description (abstract)

In this collection, we used an online focus group method hosting 7 focus groups to collect qualitative data. Our study included 24 autistic participants (aged 18 - 44, 70% female) with 2 – 4 participants attending each focus group. All participants reported having an autism diagnosis and scored above the cut-off (≥ 6) on the Autism Spectrum Quotient – 10 (AQ-10) (M = 8.71, SD = 1.15, range = 7 – 10). Participants were recruited online via social media channels. Originally 29 participants volunteered to participate, but we excluded 1 prior to taking part for not having an autism diagnosis, and 4 participants did not attend on the day.

The results of the content analysis showed that supermarkets, eateries (i.e., restaurants, cafés, pubs), highstreets and city/town centres, public transport, healthcare settings (i.e., doctor’s surgeries and hospitals), and retail shops and shopping centres, are experienced to be commonly disabling sensory environments for autistic adults. Additionally, through reflexive thematic analysis we identified 6 key principles that underlie how disabling or enabling sensory environments are: Sensoryscape (sensory environment), Space, Predictability, Understanding, Adjustments, and Recovery. We represented these principles as a web to emphasise the interconnected, dimensional spectrum of the different themes. Lastly, we used case study analysis to evidence these principles in the commonly disabling sensory environments for richer detail and context and to provide credibility for the principles.

Our findings have important implications for businesses, policy, and built environment designers to reduce the sensory impact of public places to make them more enabling for autistic people. By making public spaces more enabling, we may be able to improve quality of life for autistic individuals.

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