Texts and Effects: Interview Findings on Neurodiversity and Representation

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Gibson, M. F., Livingstone, B., Easton, S., Monroe, H., & Gruson-Wood, J. (2025). Texts and Effects: Interview Findings on Neurodiversity and Representation. Neurodiversity, 3. https://doi.org/10.1177/27546330251350740

Publication date: 1 May 2025 Added to AutiHub: 27 Aug 2026 Type: Article Article language: English
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Authors

Publication authors
5
Publication authors identified as autistic
1 / 5 (20.0%)
  1. M. F. Gibson
  2. Bridget Livingstone
  3. Steacy Easton *
  4. Hannah Monroe
  5. J. Gruson-Wood

Abstract

What texts do people use to think about, understand, and build upon the language and concept of ‘neurodiversity’? This article presents findings from an institutional ethnography study in which participants in Ontario, Canada each selected and discussed a text – any written, visual, or recorded source – that had influenced their understanding of neurodiversity. This analysis focuses on findings from interviews with the 44 neurodivergent participants. We found that participants were sometimes very connected to discussions on neurodiversity and sometimes new to or isolated from them. Our findings highlight the impact of influential texts such as the movie Rain Man and the book NeuroTribes, and confirm the structural dominance of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. While participants expressed varied opinions about specific items (e.g. television shows), all participants described a limited representational landscape. Participants talked about how neurodivergent people have unequal access to status and expertise; texts can be one way to mobilize the ‘expert’ status of others, or to assert the expertise of neurodivergent people. In hearing from neurodivergent people about how texts contribute their understanding of neurodiversity, researchers can learn about the everyday social impact of representation across institutional contexts. Lay abstract What books, shows, websites, movies, and other texts do people think about when they are talking about neurodiversity? We interviewed 44 neurodivergent people in Ontario, Canada, to find out what they thought about neurodiversity. Interviews were done in person or online through Zoom. The people who were interviewed chose a “text” that they thought was related to neurodiversity and explained what they thought and felt about it. Texts could be anything that is recorded: books, movies, shows, music, webcomics, and more. We examined what people selected and what was important to them about their selections. We found that some people were really connected to ideas and language about neurodiversity and had lots of places and people where they could discuss it, while others did not know many others who talked about neurodiversity. We learned that a few texts affected a lot of other beliefs and experiences - we called these “boss texts”. People also shared a lot of different feelings about how different texts (such as shows or books), but a problem everyone shared is that there are few representations of neurodivergent people that everyone could feel okay about. People also talked about how some texts could be taken more seriously than others based on who created them, and it could take a lot of work to find texts that were helpful. They also discussed how important it is to have texts created by neurodivergent people. Some people even decided to create their own texts. In asking participants about texts, researchers are able to hear different perspectives about neurodiversity from people whose knowledge is often ignored.

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Cited bibliography overview

These indicators describe the bibliography cited by this publication. An author name is counted each time it appears in one cited reference, so the same person can be counted more than once. Names not yet linked to an author already present in AutiHub are treated as unknown, not as non-autistic. Last computed: 12 Sep 2026 01:04.

Cited references
61
With a DOI
50
Without a DOI, from raw bibliography text
10
18 / 61 (29.5%) cited references include at least one author identified as autistic.
References with data to complete
3 / 61 (4.9%)
References with detected author names
58 / 61 (95.1%)
Without detected author names
3
Without a structured title
2
Without a stable identifier
8
References with raw author names still to review
2
References with external metadata lookup issues
1
These indicators apply to cited references displayed on this page, after technical duplicates have been merged. A reference without a DOI can still support author statistics when a title and author names are available.
Author names detected in the cited bibliography
137
From DOI or external metadata
137
From validated raw bibliography text
0
Raw names already validated
0
Raw names still to review
2
85 / 137 (62.0%) names are linked to an author already present in AutiHub. 52 / 137 (38.0%) names are not yet linked.
Names linked to a person identified as autistic
31 / 137 (22.6%)
Calculated across all author names detected in the cited bibliography. Among names linked to an author already present in AutiHub: 31 / 85 (36.5%). Distinct people identified as autistic: 21 / 114 (18.4%).
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