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Neurosocial and Neuroperipheral Through the Lens of Monotropism Monotropism, a framework developed by Dinah Murray, describes how attentional resources are organized—whether attention is broadly distributed across many channels or deeply focused into fewer priorities at a time. Many people have asked for clearer definitions of neurosocial (NS) and neuroperipheral (NP), and how these terms relate to the neurodiversity movement’s language of neurotypical and neurodivergent. This document responds by clarifying these distinctions through the lens of monotropism. NS and NP are parallel identity terms, not replacements. They describe functional patterns of attention, prediction, and energy regulation rather than diagnostic categories or social identity alone. While neurotypical and neurodivergent language has been essential for visibility, rights, and community formation, it does not always map cleanly onto the regulatory strategies that shape how people allocate attention, manage stress, and engage with complex environments. These distinctions reflect long-recognized patterns in human communities, which have always included both stabilizing individuals, whose regulatory strategies support social coordination and distributed attention, and peripheral individuals, artists, explorers, pattern-seekers, and deep specialists whose depth-oriented cognition supports adaptation and growth. This is cooperative neurodiversity: diverse regulatory strategies as a normal feature of functioning systems. Within CAS materials: Neurosocial refers to attentional and regulatory patterns most commonly supported and rewarded in contemporary social systems, including distributed attention, rapid context switching, and social synchronization. Neuroperipheral refers to patterns that tend to operate at the edges of these systems, prioritizing depth, precision, and sustained focus, often at higher energetic cost when environments demand constant switching or unpredictability. Through a monotropism lens, NS profiles more often rely on polytropic attention, while NP profiles more often rely on monotropic attention—selective, sustained, and deep. This reflects differences in regulatory organization, not differences in capability or value. This framing helps clarify a persistent source of confusion in neurodiversity conversations: the assumption that neurotypicality represents a single healthy norm and neurodivergence represents deviation or deficit. Instead, distress often arises from misalignment between system demands and regulatory capacity. When NP individuals are required to operate as though they have NS regulatory architecture—constantly switching, broadly monitoring, and socially synchronizing—the energetic cost compounds. The issue is not the peripheral pattern; it is the mismatch and the neurosocial niche creation. 2015 Poster https://lnkd.in/gFxefasS

Introducing Cybercultural's history of web design, from the grey web pages of 1993 to the colorful, mobile-centric web designs of 2012. A celebration of the peak years of personal websites and blogs.

The president decimated the U.S. government’s digital design agencies and replaced them with a personal propaganda czar.

This study examines how neurodivergent undergraduates navigate higher education by theorizing neurotypical perspectivelessness—the institutional erasu…

Published in Clinical and Experimental Optometry (Ahead of Print, 2026)

An Introduction to the Series and its Author

Can clothes really influence how today's knowledge workers get the job done or advance their careers? Take a look inside Gen Z's new "business casual".

They pathologised my flow state. They called it “perseveration.” Said I was “inflexible.” Tried to fix something that wasn’t broken, just interrupted. But what they called dysfunction was how I survived. Deep focus, time blindness, repetition; ok, if we’re pathologising, they’re symptoms. But they’re also anchors. Safety. Joy. Control. Being utterly absorbed. My way of filtering the noise. It could be work, or playing Rollercoaster Tycoon until it was suddenly dark outside, and I was dehydrated. New research says what many of us have known all along: Autistic folks don’t just experience flow. We live there. We build entire worlds from it. And when we’re allowed to stay in that state? We’re powerful as fuck. It’s about peace, not productivity and being a commodity. It’s about being left the hell alone to do what our brains were built to do. If you’re autistic and you’ve been shamed for how you think, focus, or stim (of course you have) Remember this: Your flow state is sacred. A feature. Neurotypical folks are encouraged to get into flow. Hold on to yours when it arrives because transitioning from inertia is hard, and hitting that sweet spot lets us get shit done.

For decades, autism research compared autistic people to animals, denied them moral sensitivity, and assumed autistic traits made them miserable. All wrong.

A blog about making culture. Since 1999.

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A theory of culture and attention

Sami Timimi's new book paints neurodivergent and trans people as dupes of neoliberalism

In the wake of the most recent Supreme Court term, it’s clear the trans movement must change legal and political course—but what might that look like?

What a terrible year. Good riddance to today being the very last of it. Way back when I used to publish things on Hack Education, I was always proud of my end-of-year stories -- the series of articles I posted annually that tried to chronicle all the incredibly awfulness that ed-tech had wrought in the prior months. It was important, I believed, to remember and reflect; capitalism and technology work hand-in-hand to encourage us to forget, to move on. I toyed with the idea of doing the same thi

The disability justice icon's last message: "Don’t let the bastards grind you down."

This groundbreaking A-Z of neurodiversity provides an accessible and definitive resource for professionals, families, and anyone seeking to better understand the vast landscape of neurodiversity as well as the experiences and potential of neurodivergent people. Covering over 370 terms, the book offers a nuanced understanding of each term’s multifaceted relevance and is structured around seven key categories: Neurodivergent identities, states, and models Emotional and mental health and well-be

AN NPR survey finds that people with disability still find hotels unaccommodating, even 35 years after passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Autistic people often face challenges in face-to-face social interactions, especially in unfamiliar or high-stakes situations. Virtual reality has been proposed...

Apparent increases in autism and other forms of neurodivergence are often interpreted as a rise in incidence. Yet demographic expansion, diagnostic broadening, and growing cultural awareness all con

Every few years, the tires on your car wear thin and need to be replaced. But where does that lost tire material go? The answer, unfortunately, is often waterways, where the tiny microplastic particles from the tires’ synthetic rubber carry several chemicals that can transfer into fish, crabs and perhaps even the people who eat them. We are analytical and environmental chemists who are studying ways to remove those microplastics – and the toxic chemicals

Are They Neurodivergent - Autism, ADHD, And Other Neurodivergent History · Episode