Neurodiversity in Clinical Practice: identifying, assessing and accompanying neurodivergent adults

An in-depth continuing education programme on neurodivergent profiles, built for clinical psychologists.

Picture a patient who is bright, verbally fluent and professionally established — and yet something does not add up. Social contact leaves them drained for no apparent reason. Since childhood they have carried the sense of being an outsider. Years of chronic anxiety have barely responded to standard treatment. And, almost apologetically, they admit they sometimes wonder whether they are simply “wired differently.”

Such a patient may well be neurodivergent — and in an ordinary psychology practice these patients are anything but rare: some 15 to 20% of the population is thought to show a form of neurodivergence, which could mean 3 or 4 people out of a caseload of 20.

Across 6 modules created specifically for psychologists and allied mental health professionals, this course hands you the clinical keys to spot these profiles, decode their inner logic and adjust the way you work — whether or not the patient carries an official diagnosis.

Learning outcomes

When you have completed the course, you will be able to:

1. Identify the principal neurodivergent profiles in adults. Tell apart ASD, ADHD, giftedness, specific learning disorders and atypical sensory processing as they appear in adulthood — presentations that often bear little resemblance to the textbook child descriptions — and detect the masked complaints (anxiety, depression, burnout) that can hide an unrecognized profile.
2. Understand the mechanisms these profiles share. Work confidently with the transversal concepts: masking and camouflage, developmental asynchrony, emotional dysregulation, late diagnosis and the identity questions it raises — and see why the profiles overlap so heavily without losing your clinical bearings.
3. Tailor the therapeutic frame. Apply concrete adjustments to communication style, session structure, sensory environment and treatment goals; know the validated assessment tools and when a referral for specialist evaluation is warranted.
4. Hold an ethical position informed by the neurodiversity paradigm. Separate neurological difference from clinical suffering, take the identity dimension seriously in the therapeutic relationship, and accompany the post-diagnosis journey — relief, anger, mourning, identity rebuilding — with fitting tools.

Course content

Six modules, followed at your own pace, delivered as video lectures presented by an avatar.

1. Introduction to neurodiversity — key definitions (neurotypical vs neurodivergent), history of the concept and of the neurodiversity movement, the medical and neurodiversity models, a panorama of the profiles, prevalence and underdiagnosis, and the DSM-5 / ICD-11 landmarks.
2. ASD in adulthood — DSM-5 criteria and support levels, the “clinical iceberg” of adult presentation, sensory particularities, masking (mimicry, scripting, stim suppression) and its costs (autistic burnout, identity confusion, delayed diagnosis), the female phenotype, differential diagnosis and comorbidity, and adapting the therapeutic frame.
3. ADHD in adulthood — how the concept evolved and persists after childhood, the three presentations, executive functions (time blindness, dysregulation, inhibition, task initiation), emotional dysregulation and Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria, the female profile, assessment instruments (CAARS, ASRS, DIVA 2.0), and treatment avenues: psychoeducation, Safren-based CBT, coaching, medication.
4. Giftedness — definitions (IQ ≥ 130), prevalence and the limits of IQ, cognitive versus holistic models (Dabrowski), associative thinking, the four asynchronies, overexcitabilities, typical zones of suffering (isolation, perfectionism, impostor feelings, chronic boredom), myths versus clinical reality, twice-exceptional profiles, and orientation options.
5. Learning disorders and sensory hypersensitivity — what the “dys” family shares neurobiologically; adult dyslexia, dyspraxia (DCD), dyscalculia, dysorthographia and developmental language disorder; atypical sensory processing across the senses and interoception; sensory overload and emotional regulation; accommodations at work and elsewhere.
6. Complex presentations and synthesis — the comorbidity map and the logic behind the overlaps (shared genetics, transdiagnostic dimensions), the AuDHD profile, neurodivergence and trauma, a clinical method for complex cases (developmental history, dimensional reading, prioritising by suffering), diagnostic traps, late diagnosis and identity integration, and the stance of the neurodiversity-informed clinician.