Neurodivergent Friendships
Rebecca J Sharman, Teresa SeedorfThere is anecdotal evidence of neurodivergent (ND) people preferentially befriending each other. Here we present large-scale mixed-methods evidence investigating whether neurotype affects friendship making and exploring ND and neurotypical (NT) experiences of being friends with ND people. Our results show that ND people have significantly more ND friends than NT people. Furthermore, people have proportionally more friends with the same neurotype as their own, for example, autistic people have more autistic friends. We used reflexive thematic analysis to address the questions of what participants like and dislike about their friendships with ND people, and whether there is something different about those friendships. Five themes were found that highlight issues of miscommunication between different neurotypes, the joy of communicating in your preferred style, the sense of connectedness and belonging between ND friends, the issues associated with having friends with conflicting needs to your own, and the complexities of giving and receiving support. We discuss these findings in terms of ND culture and acceptance of inherent differences in friendship styles.
Lay Abstract
Many people believe that neurodivergent (ND) people prefer being friends with other ND people, however, it is not clear whether this is actually the case. In this article, we look at whether a person's brain type affects the proportion of friends they have from different groups and ask people about their experiences of being friends with ND people. Our results show that ND people have mostly ND friends, and neurotypical (NT) people have mostly NT friends. We also found that people have more friends with the same type of brain as their own, for example, autistic people have more autistic friends. When we asked people about their friendships with ND people, we found five main topics of discussion (1) difficulties in communication with people with a different type of brain, (2) joy at being friends with people who like to communicate in the same way as you, (3) a sense of connectedness and belonging between ND friends (4) issues when friends needs conflict with each other, for example, if one person needs quiet and the other needs to make a noise, (5) how complicated it can be to give and receive support, particularly when you may have challenges of your own. We talk about the idea of ND people having their own culture, with friendships that work a bit differently to their NT counterparts.