Dr Chloe Farahar was invited to write a guest article for University College London, Unit for Stigma Research blog, titled: A rose by any other name would smell…of stigma (or, the psychologically important difference between being a “person with autism” or an Autistic person).
“Question: Is identifying with social groups beneficial to people’s health and wellbeing? Whilst marking undergrad essays on this question back in 2020 – my mind began to wander, as it is prone to do, to Autistic things. Although my PhD was in the field of social psychology – where I attempted to reduce mental health stigma with the neurodiversity narrative – I had become so engrossed in my little sliver of the field I forgot about other social psychological theories and approaches. I researched the references my students were citing and made a short Twitter thread of my thoughts regarding the psychologically important difference between being a “person with autism” and an Autistic person. The difference between belonging to a stigmatised group, and the social cure properties of strongly identifying with an Autistic identity…” continue reading HERE.
View the video that accompanies the invited article for University College London HERE or below.
Thank you for sharing this remarkably spot on dialogue â much apricated.
Best wishes
Jacque
Jacque Hunter
Industry Liaison Officer Science
ekcgroup.ac.uk
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As I have now come to expect, your words make great food for thought. Previously, I had seen the self-labelling as ‘Autistic person’ vs ‘person with autism’ as being down to personal choice (although I ferociously hated the latter term). Now I can see so much more clearly why ‘person with autism’ is such a damaging term to self-inflict (or to allow others to use). Thank you!