Studies suggest that autistic women and girls camouflage and mask their autistic traits due to a number of reasons, that may have future consequences, contributing to mental health conditions such as stress, anxiety and depression (Cage & Troxell-Whitman, 2019; McQuaid, Lee & Wallace, 2020).

Camouflaging includes any behaviour or strategies that hide (or mask) autistic features in the social environment, so as to appear ‘normal’, and is common experience for autistic people, as a neurodivergent person, in a ‘neurotypical’ world (Cage & Troxell-Whitman, 2019; McQuaid, Lee & Wallace, 2020). One study found that autistic people camouflage for the following reasons 1) To ‘fit in’ and ‘pass’ in society 2) To avoid bullying by others 3) Concerns about how one would appear when not camouflaging 4) From habit, and 5) Internalised stigma. Furthermore, this study suggested that there were gender differences in the reasons for camouflaging. Through an intersectional lens, autistic women are a minority group, facing barriers shaped from the male-centred narrative around autism. Additionally, this contributes to a lack of understanding in the community of the female autistic presentation, thus enforcing stereotypes of women and autism (Cage & Troxell-Whitman, 2019).

In addition, McQuaid, Lee & Wallace, 2020, found in their study, that autistic women showed higher levels of camouflaging compared to autistic men, across all three CAT-Q subscales. The CAT-Q is a self-report measure of social camouflaging behaviours, with camouflaging defined by three subscales of assimilation, compensation and masking. ‘Compensation’ are the strategies an autistic person uses to compensate for social difficulties; ‘assimilation’ refers to strategies used by an autistic person to ‘fit in’ to uncomfortable situations; and ‘masking’ refers to how an autistic person ‘hides’ their autistic persona/image (Hull et al., 2018).

So what does this mean? The costs of camouflaging and masking for an autistic person puts them at greater risk of mental health conditions, including stress, anxiety, depression, and suicidal ideation. As well as being detrimental to an autistic person’s mental health, it may also contribute to missed, misdiagnosed or late diagnosis in autistic women and girls (Cage & Troxell-Whitman, 2019; Hull et al., 2018; McQuaid, Lee & Wallace, 2020).

Now is the time to understand further, gender differences in autistic presentation, to help breakdown misleading stereotypes of autism, so we can provide education and understanding to the ‘neurotypical’ community of autism, and what it means to be an autistic person.

Nat x

References:

Cage, E., & Troxell-Whitman, Z. (2019). Understanding the reasons, contexts and costs of camouflaging for autistic adults. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 49(5), 1899-1911.

Hull, L., Mandy, W., Lai, M. C., Baron-Cohen, S., Allison, C., Smith, P., & Petrides, K. V. (2019). Development and validation of the camouflaging autistic traits questionnaire (CAT-Q). Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 49(3), 819-833.

McQuaid, G. A., Lee, N. R., & Wallace, G. L. (2021). Camouflaging in autism spectrum disorder: Examining the roles of sex, gender identity and diagnostic timing.