#INSAR26 I have a poster today! It covers ambiguous language interpretation, a novel creativity task we've been developing, and our experiences with using LLMs for qualitative coding. Fri 12.30-1.30, poster 21B: "How does autism impact adults' ability to identify and exploit ambiguous language?"

Today we are showcasing a published article by @heasutherland.com (@cam.ac.uk), @cjcrompton.bsky.social, Joseph Long (Scottish Autism) and @suereviews.bsky.social in the Sage journal Neurodiversity. This study explored autistic people's experiences of social communication with non-autistic people.

I've got this ongoing issue where I intermittently think "I'd love to start a blog about my various autism research thoughts", but a) have no time, and b) can't think of anything I urgently want to write about that doesn't feel like it might potentially involve swinging a bat at a hornet's nest.

This is cool! National Autistic Taskforce offering small funding awards to autistic people based in the UK, for work supporting autistic people to live their best lives. Closing date is 28th Feb. nationalautistictaskforce.org.uk/nat-founders...

📜 New preprint with my INSAR '25 co-panelists - "Making space for Autistic people with ‘complex support needs’: Recommendations for inclusive research practices". About our experiences doing neurodiversity-oriented and participatory research with autistic people with CSN. osf.io/preprints/ps...

📃New paper alert!📃 Editorial with @suereviews.bsky.social and @sarah595.bsky.social on doing research in high support needs autism services. We cover practical challenges, ethics, consent/assent issues, safeguarding, and the emotional burdens of research. journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

🪧 Thank you to @heasutherland.com, Verity Ward and Jill Bradshaw for sharing your fantastic research! Read the full article 🔗 www.manchester.ac.uk/about/news/i... #ResearchMethods #Methodology #CreativeMethods (3/3)

This is happening tomorrow! You can get both in-person and online tickets still.

It's just 🚨3 DAYS 🚨 until MethodsLab: Listening to the non-speaking experience With workshops from @talkingmats.bsky.social & Digital Stories & talks from @heasutherland.com, Verity Ward, Jill Bradshaw & Freddie Jones. 🗓️ Friday 7 Nov ⏰ 11-4:30pm 📍 AMBS Book now 🏃 www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/1683441712...

📢 Speaker announcement - Dr Holly Sutherland AuDHD researcher and postdoctoral research associate at the University of Cambridge, Holly has worked with a range of qualitative and quantitative methods to explore the #neurodiverse experience. We're excited to have Holly at MethodsLab on 7 Nov!

I'm going to be at this fantastic event on doing qualitative research with non-speaking neurodivergent people. I'll be talking about ethnography as an inclusive methodology when working with autistic adults with high support needs. Would love to see you there! www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/methodslab...

Editing the research proposal for a grant application with a bad head cold, and I think perhaps I have unlocked a specific circle of hell.

Today's new academic achievement is my first fellowship rejection 🥲

I'm coming to realise that the primary purpose of a doctoral thesis is that it's essentially a nicely-organised citation repository for my specific interests.

Thanks to @cfaa.bsky.social for having me speak at their AI symposium, & @heasutherland.com for joining me in our panel session on the science and considerations around AI use across different human-computer interactions. Glad to have met some lovely experts across a range of sectors using AI! ✈️ 👩‍💻 ⚓

Hello! Im at #AECongress25 - do come say hi if you see me. I also have a talk this afternoon about the double empathy problem in care and support services!

Does neurotype affect social connection? Our new @PLOSONE paper finds autistic people report lower rapport in conversations, but it's not that simple. We found that awareness of who you're talking to is key! Paper link (OA): doi.org/10.1371/jour...

I'm going to be speaking at this, as part of the "Human-AI teaming: Whose voices are missing?" session - talking about how neurodivergent voices and minds need to be included when designing AI to work collaboratively with humans.

Belated because I've been super busy, but I graduated a few weeks ago! I'm *officially* Dr. Sutherland now. Not sure I can really explain what that means to me - I've wanted a doctorate for as long as I can remember. Huge thanks to the wonderful supervisors who helped get me there. 💜

Would really love it if I could verbally reason with R Studio, actually. (Brought to you by: an error message telling me I can only use Function A with Function B, which is... the exact function I'm using it with... via identical syntax to that in the documentation...)

Hello! I do cognitive science-ish things, neurodiversity (mostly autism), mixed methods research, and sometimes weird interdisciplinary stuff. I love giving talks. Currently doing a postdoc at @ Cambridge. You can find my papers, datasets, talks archive etc. on my website: www.heasutherland.com

In honour of the fact I have hair now: new profile photo! This way I will hopefully stop alarming people by being unexpectedly not-bald when I see them at conferences.

Very excited to be attending the Critical Neurodiversity Studies conference today, from the @ndhumanities.bsky.social network. Sad I can't be there in person, but their online provision is wonderful, and lots of very cool speakers in the lineup...

If you're interested in autism, religious experience, and people who are minimally-speaking / have higher support needs, do check out this job at U of Aberdeen: www.abdnjobs.co.uk/vacancy/rese... You'd get to work on a very interesting project with a really great team.

This is now published in the Scandinavian Journal of Disability Research! ▶️ sjdr.se/articles/10....

Just got an invite to review a paper, from a journal which I had, no more than *two hours before*, submitted a paper review to. Please... a week between reviews, I beg... one week is all I ask for...

I’m so excited to share that our call for papers for a special issue of ‘ #Neurodiversity’ is now live! We’re looking for papers, podcasts, videos (and more) that align with the critical turn in #ND studies! 🤩 @ainokash.bsky.social @louisecreechan.bsky.social journals.sagepub.com/pb-assets/cm...

UK Channel 5 show Are You Autistic? channel5.com/show/are-you... through interviews w/ autistic people & autism researchers a GP shows sensory issues & camouflaging, hence females, are better recognized. Consistent w/ autism as innate, lifelong, sensory-based. 1/ www.frontiersin.org/journals/int...

New paper alert! Information transfer within and between autistic and non-autistic people is out today in @nathumbehav.nature.com nature.com/articles/s41... THREAD! 🧵⬇️

The podcast I did about my PhD research with the wonderful Middletown Autism Centre is now out: www.buzzsprout.com/1184276/epis... (+ Apple & Spotify ) It's a pretty casual chat, not a super technical academic thing - so if you're a carer, practitioner, etc. do give it a listen!

Thesis corrections were submitted Saturday! Three added sections on the ethics of and participation recruitment for my studies, and also a bit on my epistemology and how that interacted with my methods. It was hard work to write them, but I'm glad I did it - the thesis is better with them in.

Phone recharged! Time for the brilliant @heasutherland.com Communicatively Resourceful, Interpretatively Curious: (mis)Communications in Social Care Settings for Autistic People with High Support Needs. An ethnography 🤩 in interactional relationships.

Another excellent and very thorough live-skeet of our panel today, for those who couldn't be there in person!

Now hearing the fantastic @heasutherland.com present on her PhD research looking at communication in social care setting for autistic people with high support needs. Holly opens by highlighting that there is a gap of research in this area. #INSAR2025

Now attending the Neurodivergence-Affirming and Inclusive Research Practices for Autistic Peopke with High Support Needs panel discussion: @drstevenkapp.bsky.social, @dianatan.bsky.social, @heasutherland.com & Teresa Gironomo are live presenting, Aimee Grant & Jackie Ryan have recorded. #INSAR2025

So honoured our work on social motor synchrony and rapport received an INSAR award! While I regret not being there in person tomorrow, the brilliant @sarah-foster.bsky.social will be presenting. Please stop by Poster 442.292 in Hall 4A at 12:30 to chat with her! #INSAR2025

“Autistic people have been researched to death. We need to research autistic people back to life.” Grant Bruno. Fabulous.

@heasutherland.com is part of my invited panel (co-chaired by Diana Tan) on neurodivergence-affirming research for autistic people w/ high support needs Saturday 10:30-12:30 at #INSAR2025. Also presenting: Aimee Grant @proudmum95.bsky.social Teresa Girolamo. Discussants: Grant Blasko, Vikram Jaswal.

Nordahl: With proper support, there is no reason why autistic people with high support needs cannot participate in research. Not every attempt will be successful, but researchers should learn how to accommodate high-support autistic subjects so they can at least try to be included. #INSAR2025

If you’re at autism research conference #INSAR2025 in Seattle please look out for the following research in which I was privileged to be involved! By @heasutherland.com presenting on the relationships autistic people in social care services have with staff, autistic and non-autistic

Who on here is going to INSAR this week? #INSAR25 Drop a comment if you'd like to meet up (either before or during! I'm around from Tuesday onwards, minus a few prior commitments) - it'd be great to catch up with people, or to meet people I only know as profile pics on here :)

I'm always bewildered when people reply to my work, which often amounts to "we should try being nicer and more accomodating to autistic people", with "NO, autism is a DISABILITY". Like. That's a true but entirely unrelated point. Unless you're saying we should be mean to disabled people...?

This is now peer reviewed and out in Neurodiversity - my first published PhD output! 📰 journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

Reminder that I'm doing a talk tomorrow for the Middletown Centre on neuro-affirming support for autistic people with higher support needs. Aimed at carers, professionals, parents etc. - do come along! More info & ticket link: www.heasutherland.com/talk/neuro-a...

Reminding me that I really, *really* need to take "Empire of Normality" with me to read on my annual leave next week. (Fein, 2018; "Autism as a Mode of Engagement")

Thesis corrections continue; currently reading Elizabeth Fein's "Innocent Machines", which a) is excellent and I'm a little bit obsessed, but b) is going to necessitate a glass of wine to get through, I think.

We're now a month out from INSAR 2025. So it's a good time to mention that, on the Saturday, I'll be on a panel about the neurodiversity paradigm and how it applies to and benefits autistic people with higher support needs. See you there! www.heasutherland.com/talk/neurodi...

Belated, but really excited to announce I'll be speaking at Autism Europe #AEC2025 about my ethnographic work involving the neurodiversity paradigm and autistic people with higher support needs!

This morning, I had the pleasure of talking at @autisticsociety.bsky.social's conference about neuroaffirming practice. This afternoon, I was looking over my autism diagnosis report (from '08!), and saw this at the end of it. Got a lot of feelings about now being part of producing those resources...

There is still time to book for our one day conference on #Religion, #Disability and #Neurodivergence! The day is for anyone interested in the intersection of disability, neurodivergence and religion and is for academics, practitioners and people wanting to hear some really fab work! /1/