Thread by @DrAmyPearson

New paper alert: Buckle up (pun intended) for something a little bit different from @DrSHodgetts and I on autistic people and...kink?!

A thread 🧵

liebertpub.com/doi/10.1089/au…

Now those who are familiar with my work know that most of what I do focusses on fairly bleak, but very important aspects of autistic experience, like interpersonal abuse and stigma.

This project was a bit of a palate cleanser & the opportunity to do something a bit different

@DrSHodgetts and I discussed running this after finding that a chunk of our sample on another (currently shelved) BDSM project were autistic. We wanted to do something exploratory, joyful, and positive. Something that explored autistic intimacy in a non-pathologising way.

We interviewed 6 wonderful people about their experiences, and then used #IPA to analyse the data. It was Sophie's first time doing qual, and mv first time (when designed) leading a purely qual study (that didnt start as part of a mixed methods approach)

We asked people about their experiences of BDSM/kink and how it related to their autistic identity. We found that it was, as Bucky put it "comforting, reassuring and ...hot". (That should be read with a slightly cheeky and wry grin). It provides sensory exploration and...

a sense of emancipation from neuronormative ideas about what intimacy should look like, aligning with @WalkerSensei 's amazing work on neuroqueering....

We originally submitted this to a couple of more general sex journals, who said they thought it was a bit 'niche' and might be better suited in an autism related journal. Im not going to lie, this annoyed me more than a little...

As it implies that our experiences somehow dont come under the wider remit of human intimacy. However, we found it a home in the wonderful @AutismAdulthood ...

It would be lovely to see this reach a wider interested audience, so if anyone in the broader area wants to share/pass it on (@DrSprankle @JustinLehmiller ) please do...

and thank you very much to all of our wonderful participants, delightful reviewers and you for reading.

Oh and if you cant access at the journal you can get it here: osf.io/dthr3/