Neurospace in Action: a phenomenological exploration into the benefits of self-stimulatory movement and its application to learning. / Imogen Hunt (2024)

In this research project, I have explored self-stimulatory movement (known colloquially, and in this document as ‘stimming’/’stims’) and how I can incorporate it into movement, dance and teaching practices. Self-stimulatory behaviour or stimming is a natural, physical, repeated action used to regulate the energy in the body to reduce stress and anxiety, reduce environmental sensory input, and/or express feelings. When coming from the body (as opposed to a fidget toy or suchlike) the person will repeat one specific movement for a long time (e.g., swaying/rocking or clapping). (Coltrin, A. (2017). Dye, X. (2022). Kelly, O. (Host).) Throughout this document, I will refer to neurodivergent people. In the context of this research, I use it to mean a person with the most common types of neurodivergence e.g.: ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) or ADD (Attention Deficit Disorder), Autism or ASD (Autistic Spectrum Disorder), Dyscalculia, Dyslexia and/or Dyspraxia. ‘Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is a condition that affects people’s behaviour. People with ADHD can seem restless, may have trouble concentrating and may act on impulse.’ (NHS, 2021). Attention Deficit Disorder is much like the above but allows a more open definition by removing the ‘Hyperactivity’ word to encompass people who experience inattention instead. Inattention, here, meaning inability to focus your mind without the external outburst of hyperactivity. Autism or Autistic Spectrum Disorder is a neurological difference affecting the way in which a person processes information. This can include difficulties with things such as: socialisation, sensory processing, expressing emotions, anxiety and more. Dyslexia and Dyscalculia are learning differences that mean a person’s brain might have trouble sequencing or patterning things. I am diagnosed with both of these learning differences, and I am affected by numbers getting switched around in my head. For example, if I was doing an addition sum that was twenty-seven plus fifty-three, my brain might mistake this for seventy-two plus fifty-three, which means that although my method is correct, I will get the wrong answer because I can’t process the numbers the right way around in my head. Dyspraxia is another learning difference that affects motor-co-ordination and movement. 3 As a person diagnosed with a type of neurodiversity, I am interested in challenging the notion that stimming isn’t socially acceptable behaviour. As a child, I was often told by adults in positions of authority that I was fidgeting too much, or that I shouldn’t be rocking or swaying when someone was talking to me because it demonstrated that I was not listening. This was not the case; I was just not adhering to the aesthetic of ‘listening’ that authority figures (particularly schoolteachers) deemed necessary for learning. At this stage, nobody knew that I was neurodivergent and so the fidgeting (now known to me as stimming) was seen as something I was choosing to do instead of listening and learning. The physical aesthetic of learning that is preferred in classroom education is to sit in stillness, looking at the person delivering the content, speaking when required to demonstrate knowledge or writing notes. I argue that people in any learning context should be allowed to find ways to process information and find their attention without the suppressive nature of normative beliefs about physical social behaviours. Since my diagnosis of ADD in 2021, I have since realised the actions that I felt I could not control as a child were stimming movements, and that the shame I felt and subsequent suppression of these behaviours were a form of masking, which has hindered my ability to learn later in life. This had a direct impact on both my stress levels and learning ability in Primary and Secondary School, during years Ten and Eleven of Secondary School, I dropped out of one GCSE examination and took the Foundation (shorter, simplified version of the actual GCSE) paper of Mathematics and French studies, because I was struggling to learn and retain information for every subject I was aiming to take exams in. This was embarrassing and disheartening for me during this time because I knew I could have achieved more than the Foundation results if I could intake more information reliably. This project has taught me more about how I learn physically, how that learning looks different (aesthetically) to others and how I can now help myself learn in my natural state. Additionally, I have the chance to apply this school of thought around letting go of ‘learning aesthetics’ within my own teaching practice so that I can allow my participants to be offered learning that benefits their style. During this research project, I have drawn physical parallels between dance and self-stimulatory movement. Within the context of this research, I perceive stimming to be something that I have nurtured, interrogated and developed into a valid, strengthened practice designed to enhance my dancing body and mind. As a Community Dance Artist (as well as a special needs support worker) my work at this point aims to provide a space for those who feel as I did in learning environments- out of place, embarrassed, confronted. I would describe myself as an artist who shares accessible, creative 4 opportunities for any and every ‘body’ to express and enjoy movement as a collective. I achieved this mainly through my teaching practice, I have taught and continue to teach contemporary dance/movement classes in community spaces (e.g.: churches, community hubs/centres, schools and care homes). My work is currently more focused on youth community work, but I occasionally teach adult and older adult movement classes too. My work seeks to support and provide movement-based, creative opportunities for as many different communities as possible. I am most interested in creating provision for people with learning differences, access needs and disabilities. This research aims to support my work in these areas particularly, not only for the people that I am working and collaborating with, but also myself as I navigate the working-world as a person with their own diagnosed learning differences.