For years, conversations about developmental differences and law enforcement have frequently centered on autism, and there is good reason for that. Autistic individuals may communicate differently, respond differently to sensory input, struggle with unexpected changes, engage in repetitive behaviors, or react to stressful encounters in ways that can easily be misunderstood by someone who has never received autism-specific training. These differences can have a direct impact on interactions with law enforcement, fire personnel, EMS providers, school resource officers, dispatchers, and other public safety professionals.
Autism, however, is only part of a much larger picture. As our understanding of the people we serve continues to grow, public safety professionals must begin looking beyond a single diagnosis and toward a broader understanding of neurodivergence. That does not mean we stop talking about autism. Quite the opposite. Autism remains an important and necessary focus of public safety education. It may simply be the starting point rather than the finish line.
Neurodivergence is a broad term used to describe people whose brains process information, communicate, learn, regulate emotions, or experience the world differently from what is generally considered neurologically typical. Neurodivergence is not itself a medical diagnosis. Rather, it can include autism, Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder, dyslexia, dyscalculia, dysgraphia, Tourette syndrome, developmental coordination differences, sensory processing differences, and a variety of other neurological or developmental differences.
These conditions are not interchangeable. A person with ADHD will not necessarily behave like an autistic person, and someone with Tourette syndrome may experience challenges that are completely different from those experienced by someone with dyslexia. From a public safety perspective, however, there is an important common denominator: what an officer sees may not always accurately reflect what is actually happening.
Law enforcement officers are trained to observe behavior. We notice hands, body language, facial expressions, eye contact, speech patterns, physical movements, and changes in behavior. Officers routinely evaluate whether someone appears nervous, distracted, evasive, aggressive, intoxicated, deceptive, or noncompliant. Those observations are an essential part of police work, but they are also interpretations of behavior. When neurodivergence is involved, those interpretations can sometimes be wrong.
A neurodivergent person may avoid eye contact because maintaining it is uncomfortable or overwhelming. Someone with ADHD may interrupt repeatedly, move constantly, appear distracted, or struggle to follow a lengthy series of instructions. A person with Tourette syndrome may make involuntary movements or vocalizations. An autistic person experiencing sensory overload may cover their ears, pace, rock, repeat words, retreat from an officer, or temporarily lose the ability to communicate verbally. Someone with a processing difference may simply need additional time to understand what an officer has said.
None of these behaviors automatically indicate guilt, disrespect, intoxication, aggression, deception, or defiance. The challenge for law enforcement is learning to recognize when the behavior being observed may have another explanation. That recognition can dramatically change the way an officer responds.
The goal of neurodivergence awareness training is not to turn police officers into doctors, psychologists, therapists, or diagnosticians. An officer standing along the side of a highway at two o'clock in the morning does not need to determine whether someone has autism, ADHD, a sensory processing difference, an intellectual disability, a mental health condition, or some combination of several conditions. The officer needs something much more practical: recognition.
When behavior does not seem to fit the circumstances, public safety professionals should be willing to consider that neurological differences may be influencing the encounter. That simple recognition can open the door to different response options. An officer may choose to slow the encounter down, reduce unnecessary stimulation, use clear and concrete language, provide one instruction at a time, allow additional processing time, or avoid interpreting lack of eye contact as an indication of deception.
An officer may also recognize repetitive movement as a possible form of self-regulation rather than automatically viewing it as suspicious behavior. When appropriate, officers can ask caregivers, family members, teachers, or support persons what communication strategies work best. They may create additional physical distance, reduce the number of people giving instructions, or simply allow several additional seconds for the person to process what has been said. Sometimes a relatively small adjustment by an officer can completely change the direction of an encounter.
Neurodivergence awareness is sometimes described primarily as compassion training. Compassion certainly matters, but this type of education is much more than that. It is also officer-safety training, de-escalation training, risk-management training, communication training, and decision-making training. An officer who better understands why a person may be behaving in an unexpected way has more response options, and options matter in public safety.
When an officer misinterprets neurological behavior as deliberate resistance, the encounter can escalate unnecessarily. The officer may increase the number or intensity of commands. The neurodivergent individual may become increasingly overwhelmed. Communication may deteriorate. Stress rises on both sides, and what began as confusion can quickly become confrontation. Better recognition gives officers another opportunity to interrupt that cycle before the situation reaches a critical point.
Understanding neurodivergence does not mean ignoring dangerous behavior or compromising officer safety. Neurodivergence does not eliminate an officer's responsibility to protect themselves, protect other responders, and protect the public. The objective is to respond to the actual threat that is being presented rather than escalating an encounter simply because unfamiliar behavior has been mistaken for a threat. That distinction can protect everyone involved.
As Spectrum Command Public Safety expands the conversation into neurodivergence, autism will remain a major focus of our work. There are practical reasons for that. Autistic individuals may encounter law enforcement under many different circumstances, including wandering and missing-person incidents, traffic stops, behavioral crises, welfare checks, calls for service, school incidents, victimization, suspicious-person calls, or situations in which a concerned member of the public simply misunderstood what they were seeing.
Autism also provides an important foundation for teaching public safety professionals about sensory differences, alternative forms of communication, repetitive behavior, processing delays, emotional regulation, and individualized response strategies. Once officers understand these concepts, they often begin to recognize that many of the same principles can apply to people with a wide range of neurological differences.
Throughout his law enforcement career, our founder learned that good police work requires much more than knowing statutes, policies, procedures, and tactics. It requires understanding people. His experiences working both in law enforcement and in special education environments have reinforced that lesson repeatedly.
There remains a significant gap between the public safety profession and the neurodivergent community. That gap does not exist because officers do not care. In many cases, the gap exists because officers have never been provided with the information and training necessary to recognize what they are encountering. We cannot reasonably expect public safety professionals to recognize something they have never been taught to recognize.
That is why training matters. The objective is not for officers to memorize an endless list of diagnoses, characteristics, or clinical terminology. The objective is to develop a different way of thinking when an encounter does not unfold as expected.
Instead of immediately asking, “Why won't this person comply?” perhaps we should also ask, “Is there something preventing this person from being able to comply in the way I expect?” Instead of asking, “Why is this person acting strangely?” we might consider whether the behavior is helping the person regulate themselves. Instead of assuming someone is refusing to answer, we might consider whether they need more time, fewer words, less stimulation, or another method of communication. These questions do not weaken officer authority. They strengthen officer decision-making.
No two autistic people are exactly alike. Neither are two people with ADHD, Tourette syndrome, dyslexia, sensory processing differences, or any other form of neurodivergence. There will never be a single checklist that tells an officer exactly what to do during every encounter, nor should there be. Public safety encounters are dynamic, and effective responses must be flexible.
The purpose of awareness is to give officers more options. Options create flexibility. Flexibility supports de-escalation. De-escalation improves safety. Better understanding also builds trust between public safety professionals and the communities they serve.
Spectrum Command Public Safety began with a commitment to improving encounters between law enforcement and the autism community. That commitment remains firmly in place. The mission, however, continues to grow because the need extends beyond one diagnosis. Public safety professionals must be prepared to recognize and appropriately respond to the many differences in how people think, communicate, process information, regulate themselves, and experience the world around them.
Autism is an important place to begin…but it is only the beginning.
Understanding Saves Lives.
- SCOUT
Spectrum Command’s
Public Safety Ambassador