The short answer is yes. Autistic people, like everyone else, sit across a wide emotional continuum. Some experience alexithymia (difficulty identifying or naming feelings), some have muted or mixed emotional awareness, some have a more balanced awareness and others feel other people’s states so strongly they describe hyper-empathy. Recent research shows these different profiles are real, common and important for how we support emotional wellbeing.

Emotions as a continuum (not a single “autism = no empathy” box)

A common myth rooted in older studies and stereotypes is that autistic people lack empathy. Contemporary research paints a much richer picture:

• Alexithymia (difficulty noticing, differentiating or naming one’s own feelings) is more common in autistic groups but is not the same thing as autism itself.
• Many autistic people show poorer performance on facial emotion recognition tasks on average but the challenges are not uniform.
• Empathy has subcomponents: cognitive empat
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A few days ago, I was chatting with a friend who shared a simple piece of wisdom that has revolutionised conversation with my daughter.

Like all parents, I have spent many hours teaching my children new skills. From how to hold their knife and fork or use the potty as toddlers to managing money and staying safe as teens and young adults. “Life lectures” as I called them, have featured in countless conversations on the way to school or around the dinner table at home. My mission (dutifully accepted) was to download all I knew to protect my children and help them avoid the road bumps that tripped me up.

But here’s the thing. There comes a point when children no longer want advice from their parents. They need to figure things out for themselves and find their own way in life. Spreading their wings is how they grow and learn.

And so the habit of sharing daily lessons must be shelved in favour of something different. Something that actually works rather than persisting with a tool that ...