A new study published in JCPP Advances (Pavlopoulou et al., 2025) has given adolescents with ADHD and autism the chance to speak in their own voices about what truly upsets them in daily life. Rather than focusing on medical “deficits” or external observations by adults, the research asked 57 young people (aged 11–15) to describe their lived experiences. Their answers shine a light on a simple but profound truth: the distress they experience often arises not from their neurology itself, but from how society responds to it.
What the Study Found
The research team identified four main themes in the adolescents’ stories:
- Social dislocation, alienation, and conflict
- The need to mask one’s true self
- Self-doubt, loathing, and embarrassment
- Over-stimulation and sensory mismatch
Each theme points to the ways in which environments, relationships, and societal expectations can amplify distress. For example, autistic participants often spoke of not belonging, while those with ADHD described frustration at unfairness or being controlled by adults.
One young autistic girl shared:
“When people sum autism up as a negative thing, it makes me feel like I am worthless… You can’t fix me ‘cause there is nothing wrong with me… the only thing to fix is the world’s perspective.” (Female, 12, autism)
This perspective aligns directly with the social model of disability: neurological difference is not the “problem” — the real disability comes from how environments and social attitudes exclude, stigmatise, or fail to adapt.
The Burden of Masking
Many participants spoke about the exhausting need to hide who they are. For some, masking was about avoiding conflict:
“I don’t feel good masking them, but it’s better than actually showing my feelings and getting made fun of… or maybe get a detention.” (Male, 13, ADHD)
Others described masking to protect others from their intensity:
“If I express stress… people around me might get stressed… So I think it’s just better if I don’t tell people and then they don’t have to worry about me.” (Male, 13, autism)
These accounts challenge the common belief that autistic or ADHD young people lack empathy. In fact, they often show too much, bending themselves to shield others at their own expense.
Internalised Doubt and Invisible Struggles
Another powerful theme was self-doubt and shame. Many felt inferior when judged by neurotypical standards:
“I’m not really that clever ‘cause I don’t listen in school… I’m not as clever as the others.” (Male, 11, autism)
“It annoys me because I know everyone else… it’s easy for them. It’s hard for me to get all this knowledge out and use the knowledge.” (Male, 13, ADHD)
This sense of inadequacy doesn’t come from their brains, but from an education system and a wider culture that rarely adapts to different ways of learning and being.
Sensory Worlds Misunderstood
Finally, many spoke of the overwhelming effect of sensory environments—especially school corridors, classrooms, or crowded spaces:
“[In the school corridor] it is very loud and crowded and there are people twice my height barging past me like I’m an insignificant insect… I have almost fell down the stairs multiple times and it is very scary.” (Female, 13, autism)
For ADHD participants, under-stimulation was just as painful: repetitive or “boring” lessons led to frustration, fatigue, and disengagement.
Why This Matters
The young people in this study rarely framed their challenges as “emotional dysregulation” or “failures of self-control” — language often used in diagnostic models. Instead, they pointed to environmental triggers: stigma, unfair treatment, sensory overload, exclusion, and the pressure to hide who they are.
This shifts the conversation away from what is “wrong” inside the child and towards what needs to change in schools, communities, and society. As one participant said bluntly:
“You can’t fix me… the only thing to fix is the world’s perspective.”
At The Talking Couch, we hold the same view: ADHD and autism are not pathologies to be “cured” but forms of neurodiversity to be understood, supported, and celebrated. What makes them disabling is not the difference itself, but the failure of environments and systems to adapt.
Reference
Pavlopoulou, G., Chandler, S., Lukito, S., Kakoulidou, M., Jackson, I., Ly, E., … Sonuga-Barke, E. J. S. (2025). Upsetting experiences in the lives of neurodivergent young people: A qualitative analysis of accounts of adolescents diagnosed with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder and/or autism. JCPP Advances, e70038. https://doi.org/10.1002/jcv2.70038