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I'm Vikram Jaswal.

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I'm an associate
professor of psychology

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at the University of Virginia.

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For the past three years, I've
been teaching this two semester

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seminar called the Science and
Lived Experience of Autism.

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We try to explore the tension
between what the science says

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about autism and what the lived
experience of autism is like.

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We work as a class
of about 16 students

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with a partner cohort
of non-speaking autistic

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individuals.

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They don't use spoken
language reliably

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or, in some cases, at all.

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And something that happens as
these guys are spelling out

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their responses is that the
non-autistic participants,

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we all learn to slow down.

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What we do is we come prepared
with a reading or maybe

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a video clip that
we've all watched.

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And then we spend the
entire day kind of digging

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into what we got out of it, both
from a neurotypical perspective

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and an autistic perspective.

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They basically show that there
was no significant eye fixation

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difference between
the two groups, which

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is a very surprising finding.

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A-C-T. I find the obsession
with eye contact--

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N-G-- to be annoying.

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M-A-L. I believe it is about
NTs wanting us to look normal.

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One of the goals is to get
students to think about,

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what do you do when
the science doesn't

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match the lived experience?

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It's a really wide misconception
that, if you're not displaying

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interest in a neurotypical
way, if you're not,

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for instance, making eye contact
or you're not verbalizing

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something that you
want to verbalize,

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you're just not
interested in engaging.

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But when you actually
talk to these guys

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and you spend time
with them, you

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find that, for many of them,
nothing could be further

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from the truth.

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They're longing for
social connection.

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They want to make friends.

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But their bodies just aren't
able to cooperate in a way that

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allows them to do it.

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I think the most
shocking thing continues

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to be how wrong I was about what
it looks like to be listening

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and what it looks
like to be interested.

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For the most part, the
educational experience

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of autistic folks
is one of separation

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from their typically
developing peers.

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And I see our
seminar as an example

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of how we can create an
inclusive educational

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environment.

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Part of what has to
happen is for society

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to make accommodations,
for the neurotypical folks

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to learn ways to support
autistic people as they are.

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If we come in with
a baseline of,

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let's just see what
this person can

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do, trust their capabilities,
trust their interest,

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then I think we can create
way more inclusive spaces

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because we don't bring in all
of these preconceived notions

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about what someone
can and can't do.

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