Monotropism

The differences between polytropism and monotropism

Monotropismis an individual's tendency to focus theirattentionon a small or singular number of interests at any time, with them neglecting or not perceiving lesser interests. Thiscognitive strategyhas been posited as the central underlying feature ofautism.The theory of monotropism was developed byDinah Murray,Wenn Lawson andMike Lesserstarting in the 1990s, and first published in 2005.Lawson's further work on the theory formed the basis of hisPhD,Single Attention and Associated Cognition in Autism,and bookThe Passionate Mindpublished in 2011.

A tendency to focus attention tightly has a number of psychological implications, with it being seen as a state of "tunnel vision". While monotropism tends to cause people to miss things outside their attention tunnel, within it, their focused attention can lend itself to intense experiences, deep thinking, and more specifically,flow states.However, this form ofhyperfocusmakes it harder to redirect attention, including starting and stopping tasks, leading to what is often described asexecutive dysfunctionin autism, andstereotypesorperseveration,where a person's attention is repeatedly drawn back to the same subject or activity.

Characteristics

Monotropic way of teaching

Typical classroom activity requires lot of polytropic processing of stimuli

Since the amount of attention available to a person is limited,cognitive processesare forced to compete. In the monotropic mind, interests that are active at any given time tend to consume most of the available attention, causing difficulty with other tasks such asconventional social interaction.Language developmentcan be affected, both through the broad attention required and the psychological impact of language, which provides a tool for others to manipulate a child's interest system.

Monotropic individuals have trouble processing multiple things at once, particularly when it comes to multitasking while listening. For example, some students have trouble taking notes in class while listening to a teacherand may find it difficult to read a person's face and comprehend what they are saying simultaneously.A common tendency is for individuals to avoid complex sensory environments because of this hypersensitivity.Monotropic individuals may suppress attention and focus on something else, or develop great depth in a given interest or skill.

Implications for practice

Murray et al. (2005) proposed certain steps to help autistic individuals, such as increasing "connections", building understanding through the child's interests, and making connections between people and concepts more "meaningful and less complex."

See also

• Autism and memory
• Caetextia
• Monomania
• Idée fixe
• Introversion
• Centration
• Obsessive–compulsive personality disorder

Further reading

• Lawson, Wenn (2011).The Passionate Mind: How People with Autism Learn.London:Jessica Kingsley Publishers.ISBN978-1-84905-121-7.
• Murray, Dinah(2021)."Monotropism: An Interest-Based Account of Autism".InVolkmar, Fred R.(ed.).Encyclopedia of Autism Spectrum Disorders(2nd ed.). Springer. pp. 2954–2956.doi:10.1007/978-3-319-91280-6_102269.ISBN978-3-319-91279-0.
• Murray, Fergus (30 November 2018)."Me and Monotropism: A unified theory of autism".The Psychologist.The British Psychological Society.

External links

• monotropism.orgInformation portal on monotropism, including an archive of Dinah Murray's work on the subject