What makes us tick and what makes us stick

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What makes us tick and what makes us stick?

• Timing and inertia in ASD

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Outline

• Neuroanatomy
• What makes us tick?
• Intervals
• Time and the (autistic) brain
• Time and autistic traits
• (break)

• What makes us stick?
• What is inertia?
• What isnt inertia?
• Executive function
• Attention
• Catatonia
• Strategies

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Neuroanatomy

• Pre-frontal cortex
• Cerebellum
• Basal ganglia

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Timing Introduction

• Intervals
• Circadian about 24 hours
• Interval a few seconds to minutes
• Millisecond less than 2 seconds
• Time and the brain
• Time and autistic traits

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Circadian
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Interval
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Millisecond
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Time and the (autistic) brain

• Suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN)
• Basal ganglia
• Cerebellum
• Clock genes

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Time and autistic traits

• Movement
• Language
• Change resistance
• Social timing
• Memory
• Task switching

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Summary

• Timing is important for many things from language
  perception to movements to changes
• Time perception helps give the world structure
  and helps us interact with it effectively
• Timing helps us to predict what is coming next
  and respond at the right time.

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Outline

• Neuroanatomy
• What makes us tick?
• Intervals
• Time and the (autistic) brain
• Time and autistic traits
• (break)

• What makes us stick?
• What is inertia?
• What isnt inertia?
• Executive function
• Attention
• Catatonia
• Strategies

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Introduction

• What is inertia?
• What isnt inertia?
• Executive function
• Attention
• Catatonia
• Strategies

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What is inertia

• An object in motion tends to stay in motion and
  an object at rest tends to stay at rest.
• Starting,
• stopping
• changing
• of activities and focus

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What isnt inertia?

• Lack of motivation
• Depression
• Fatigue (though it can cause sleep deprivation)
• Procrastination or avoidance
• Laziness!

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Executive function (EF)

• The minds boss or director
• EF is what stops an automatic response when a
  non-automatic response is wanted
• Includes
• planning, organising, sequencing, monitoring,
  inhibition, initiative
• One sign of impaired EF is perseveration
• Autistic people do not usually have a problem
  with inhibition, but ADHDers do.
• Lacking initiative what we call inertia

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Attention

• Slow attention shifting (see timing)
• Missing cues
• Slower to orient and respond
• Things that are easy to do and instant rewards
  (computers)

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Catatonia

• Physically stuck
• May be related to or similar to Parkinsons
  Disease
• Caused or made worse by anti-psychotic
  medication?
• Passive interaction style
• Could inertia be a very mild version?

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Strategies

• Reminders
• Shock
• The do it now principle
• Routines
• Inertia applies to routine instead of task
• Attaching new task before an automatic one
• Perceptual patterns to follow - flow
• Make it as easy as possible

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Inertia summary

• Inertia is the inability to start, stop or change
  what youre doing
• Inertia has a neurological basis and is not
  willful
• Executive function and attention switching may
  play a part and catatonia may be related
• Sometimes there are things we can do to make it
  easier.