Functioning Labels: Why We Need to Leave Them Behind

When we use functioning labels, we are adopting a fundamentally biased view of what support looks like across the entire autistic community.

When someone is labeled "high functioning," their need for accommodations is dismissed because according to whoever is doing the labeling, that person functions "almost normally." This framing ignores that autistic people across the entire spectrum face real difficulties navigating a world that was not built for them, both sensorially and structurally. It also overlooks differences in motor development and co-occurring conditions like dyslexia or dyscalculia, which are less visible but no less real. These needs don't disappear because someone can communicate verbally.

A concrete example of this are autistic people with less support needs during moments of dysregulation. Because they usually can communicate verbally, it is assumed that they always can, even in the moments when they least can. When they are in the middle of a meltdown, the people around them frequently demand explanations, expect them to defend themselves verbally, or insist they justify what they are experiencing. But verbal communication is precisely the first capacity to be affected when the nervous system enters survival mode. Forcing someone to speak in that moment is not only ineffective, it is deeply invalidating.

When the "low functioning" label is applied — most commonly to nonspeaking autistic people — the person's capabilities are systematically underestimated. Because they cannot communicate through speech, their attempts at communication are ignored or misread, leading many educators and professionals to stop adapting content to the person's actual level of comprehension. It is assumed they don't understand when in reality what exists is a difference in how they can express that understanding. This becomes clear when you understand the role of apraxia in autism. A person may have a deep comprehension of the world around them, but lack the motor control needed to demonstrate it in the ways the environment demands.

In both cases, the label doesn't describe the person, it describes the limitation of the environment to understand them.

What we need is a different framework entirely, one that stops pathologizing autistic people by focusing on their deficits, and begins to honor the genuine complexity of the spectrum.

This means, first, recognizing that autism is not primarily a communication deficit, but a difference in the way a person communicates. Autistic people communicate in diverse, rich, and valid ways, and as professionals we have a responsibility to expand the channels available for that communication, actively promoting AAC (Augmentative and Alternative Communication) not as a last resort, but as a legitimate and valuable tool from the very beginning.

Second, it means letting go of the "theory of mind deficit" narrative. The idea that autistic people lack the capacity to understand the perspective of others. This theory has been deeply and rightfully questioned. What exists is not a unilateral deficit, but a bidirectional gap: neurotypical people are equally limited in our ability to understand autistic communication and perspective. The problem is not the autistic person — it is the unwillingness of society as a whole to make the effort to understand.


* Double Empathy Problem (Milton,D.)