Camouflaging Event at The Owerko Centre

Last week, the ENHANCE Lab at the Owerko Centre hosted an event showcasing the artwork of autistic children about their experiences with camouflaging (the hiding of autistic traits to ‘fit in’, also known as social masking). The event also included a presentation of findings from the first research study to explore the experience of camouflaging among autistic children and adolescents, as well as a brainstorming session with the community about potential future directions for camouflaging research.

A highlight of the evening was Kyla’s (age 11) presentation of some of her photos from the study. Kyla shared that a photo of two magpies standing next to each other was an optical illusion in which the two birds looked like one. She explained that this represents two different sides to her: “a crazy me and a calm me”.

The study, led by Stephanie Howe and Dr. Carly McMorris, used an innovative photo-elicitation approach to understand the experiences of camouflaging in children as young as 10 years.

Read the research article and see more participant photos here: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1750946723001320