Glossary
Searchable terminology from accessibility, web standards, and related fields.
53 results found in autism.
- High-Functioning Autism (HFA, HFASD)
- A historically used term describing individuals with autism spectrum disorder who have average or above-average intellectual abilities and can communicate verbally. The term is now considered outdated…
- Improvisational Music Therapy (IMT, Creative Music Therapy)
- A therapeutic approach in which the therapist and client spontaneously create music together without predetermined structure or composed material. This form of music therapy allows non-verbal communic…
- Interoception (Interoceptive Awareness)
- The sense of the internal state of the body, including perception of heartbeat, breathing, hunger, thirst, temperature, pain, and emotional feelings. Interoception enables people to recognize and resp…
- Minimally Verbal (Minimally Speaking, Non-Speaking, Limited Verbal)
- A term describing individuals who use very few or no spoken words as their primary means of communication, despite potentially having communicative intent. This term is commonly used in autism context…
- Multi-Sensory Environment (MSE, Snoezelen, Multisensory Room)
- A specially designed space that combines sensory stimuli — such as lighting, sound, textures, and aromas — to provide therapeutic, calming, or stimulating experiences for people with disabilities. Ori…
- Music Therapy
- A clinical and evidence-based practice that uses music interventions to accomplish individualized therapeutic goals, including improving communication, social interaction, emotional expression, and mo…
- Neuroplasticity (Brain Plasticity, Neural Plasticity)
- The brain's ability to reorganize its structure and function in response to experience, learning, and environmental stimulation throughout life. Neuroplasticity is a legitimate neuroscience concept, b…
- Noise Sensitivity (Auditory Hypersensitivity, Hyperacusis, Sound Sensitivity)
- A heightened physiological and emotional response to sounds that others may tolerate without difficulty. Common among autistic individuals and people with other sensory processing differences, noise s…
- Overselectivity (Stimulus Overselectivity, Overselective Attention)
- A learning challenge in which an individual attends to only one or a few features of a stimulus while ignoring other relevant features, resulting in an inability to discriminate between stimuli that s…
- Phonophobia (Sound Phobia, Ligyrophobia)
- Phonophobia is an intense fear or aversion to specific sounds or loud noises that goes beyond simple discomfort, often leading to avoidance behaviors such as fleeing from environments where triggering…
- Picture Exchange Communication System (PECS)
- A structured augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) system that teaches individuals to use pictures to communicate with others. Developed by Andrew Bondy and Lori Frost in 1985, PECS uses a …
- Pivotal Response Training (PRT, Pivotal Response Treatment)
- A naturalistic, child-initiated behavioural intervention developed for children with autism that targets "pivotal" skills — foundational abilities whose improvement produces widespread positive change…
- Pragmatics (Pragmatic Language)
- The social use of language—how context, relationship, and conversational norms affect what we say and how we interpret others. Pragmatics includes understanding implied meaning, adjusting speech for d…
- Reciprocity (Conversational Reciprocity, Social Reciprocity)
- The back-and-forth exchange of information, questions, and responses that characterizes natural conversation. Reciprocity includes components like asking questions, responding appropriately, giving fe…
- Scaffolded interaction (Structured interaction, Guided interaction)
- A design approach where technology provides structured support that gradually guides users through increasingly complex social or cognitive tasks, with the system mechanics enforcing desired behaviour…
- Self-Scaffolding
- Self-scaffolding is a process in which learners independently create their own support structures to achieve objectives they would not have reached without that support. Unlike traditional scaffolding…
- Sensory Processing (Sensory Integration, Sensory Processing Differences)
- Sensory processing refers to the way the nervous system receives, organizes, and responds to sensory input from the environment, including sound, light, touch, smell, taste, and movement. When sensory…
- Sensory Sensitivity (Sensory Sensitivities, Hyper-/Hyposensitivity)
- Heightened or reduced responses to sensory input including sounds, lights, textures, tastes, and smells. Sensory sensitivity is common among autistic people, with approximately 74% experiencing atypic…
- Shutdown (Autistic Shutdown)
- A response to overwhelming sensory, emotional, or cognitive input in which an autistic person withdraws or retreats from their environment. Unlike meltdowns (which are outward expressions of distress)…
- Social Motor Synchrony (Interpersonal Synchrony, Motor Synchrony)
- The spontaneous or intentional coordination of body movements between two or more people during social interaction, such as matching rhythms, mirroring gestures, or moving in temporal alignment. Socia…