Stressors are those things that push the child from optimal arousal with high levels of performance and learning to distress and decreasing performance. Optimal arousal is the state in which the child’s alertness and focus are such that learning is more effective and efficient. Distress is the state at which the child becomes over-stimulated and/or overwhelmed.
For people with Introversion-Sensing-Thinking-Judging (ISTJ) preferences, like children with autism, stressors tend to be those things that violate their need for clarity, precision, planfulness, logical decision-making and time to warm up to a situation. Strikingly, the stressors Quenk found for ISTJs parallel what I have observed repeatedly in children with autism.
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The word ‘stress’ has a negative connotation for most people. Stress is anything that thrills us,worries us, scares us or threatens us. Stress can be a strong motivator and energizer at the appropriate intensity.
With too little stress or energy, a person may feel ‘bored’. For the child with autism, if the arousal drops below an optimal level, he will likely seek stimulation from other sources to keep himself alert. It may be in appropriate or inappropriate ways, for example, he may withdraw, start chewing on his shirt or poke another child.
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Continuing our last about autism behavior. Then it tickles us to know when do we know that our child having problematic behavior or its just normal act of children seeking for attentions.
Okay to answer When should we consider a behavior to be problematic enough that something should be done? I believe that a problem behavior is one that:
• interferes with the learning and development of the child himself
• interferes with the learning and development of other children
• causes a potentially unsafe situation and/or
• is socially and/or culturally inappropriate or unacceptable.
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Behavior is an action or reaction to internal and/or external events, people, objects or stimulation. It is a function of the interaction between the person and the situation.
In all children, behavior is typically either internalized or externalized. Children with autism often experience extreme patterns of internalization you may not notice initially. There may be a lengthy period of time during which the child’s internalized behavior builds up. The child may exhibit small changes or symptoms, like adhering more rigidly to routines or increased sucking or chewing of his clothes. Usually, in retrospect, caregivers who know the child well can put the pieces together and recognize when the build up started. With such a protracted time-line, determining the cause or causes can be challenging.
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Before starting work with a child with autism, it is important to look after yourself. The child with autism requires the adults around him to have a great deal of patience, understanding and energy to work effectively. Ensure that you:
• have had sufficient sleep
• are not feeling frustrated or on edge.
At the least, it is critical that you can behave in a calm and relaxed manner. This does not mean that you cannot express your feelings and emotions. They must, however, be related to the child and task at hand and not something extraneous to the situation.
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