"My Sensory Experiences Tool": A Neurodiversity-Affirming Therapeutic Tool to Support the Sensory Challenges and Preferences of Autistic Children and Adults.

Only five autistic people were interviewed directly, and the researchers say children, adolescents and adults with intellectual disability preferred parents or practitioners to answer on their behalf, so the voices of people with the highest support needs are largely missing. Everyone was recruited through one autism service provider that developed the tool and employs most of the practitioners, so these are the views of people already committed to using it. The tool has never been trialled. The authors state plainly that this approach has not been tested before and that further research is needed on outcomes and usability. The interviews and focus groups were run by researchers who had developed the tool, including two who describe themselves as insiders in its development. The authors say they tried to limit this by having outside researchers recode all the data and check the interpretation. Participants were all in Australia and spoke English at home, and the four family members were all tertiary educated. The authors note the tool is commercially available, which they say could limit access for researchers or participants with limited funding. The paper reports a change made in response to feedback, cutting the cards from 93 to 83, but no new evaluation of the shorter version is reported.

The authors declare no conflicts of interest and state that no funding was received for this manuscript. The organisation that developed and evaluated the tool, a service provider for autistic people in Queensland, funded the work, and the tool is sold commercially with profits reinvested into services for autistic people and their families and into further autism research. The authors state that none of them will benefit financially from sales of the tool. Open access publishing was covered by the University of Queensland's agreement with the publisher.

Do not read this as evidence that the tool improves anything for autistic people. The study only asked people what they thought of it, with no measurement before or after use and no comparison group, so it cannot show a change in sensory distress, participation or behaviour. The positive views also come mostly from therapists who chose to use the tool at the organisation that developed it, and only five autistic people were interviewed directly, so their perspective is thinner than the practitioner perspective it is set beside.