Emotional regulation is the ability to cope with situations that cause emotions like stress, anxiety or frustration. Sometimes, people with autism have a harder time regulating their emotions. They may rely on unique self-soothing strategies to deal with intense emotions, and either seek out or avoid sensory stimuli like bright lights, loud sounds and intense smells.

Every person with autism manages their sensory input in a different way and their emotional regulation skills can vary. It’s difficult to make any blanket statements on the signs of dysregulation, but generally, any kind of change in behavior can indicate that a person is having a hard time managing their emotions. You may see an increase in things like self-stimulatory behavior, including flapping, stimming, pacing or rocking.

Putting the identification first helps create the building blocks of emotional self-awareness, making it easier to understand how to manage over-stimulation or under-stimulation in the environment. If you’re not sure where to begin with teaching your loved one to identify and understand their emotions, ask your care team, your child’s teacher or their therapist for guidance.

Some autistic people are sensory avoidant, meaning they self-soothe by getting away from sounds, smells and other stimuli. Other people with autism regulate their emotions by seeking out more sensory input from the environment. For example, they may make loud noises, fidget, pace or rock back and forth.

Autism Speaks’ Roadmap to Self-Empowerment for Autistic Adults takes a deep dive into sensory issues and coping mechanisms. The Roadmap has a really great tool to help you understand what drains your battery, what recharges your battery and how to develop a plan for when you need to take a step back to recharge.

Often, non-autistic people have misconceptions about self-soothing behaviors that cause a lack of real community understanding and acceptance. They may expect it to look like jumping up and down, stimming, flapping, pacing or fidgeting, but it could be going mute, going for a run or sitting in a quiet place.