A term coined by me in my PhD dissertation, “Clement Space” denotes a mental and physical ‘space’ for sensory equilibrium, an oasis in the midst of raging, parched desert sands. Like empathy, Clement Space is not some beauteous space that comes from a wave of the magician’s wand. It needs to be designed, crafted and maintained. Calm and serenity actually require a great deal of active energy in order to create and achieve. It also needs guarding against antagonistic elements from within and without, i.e. from inside our own tempests as well as from people (other) who may encroach upon our carefully built peace, whether intentionally or not. Unlike teacakes on a platter in a fancy restaurant, Clement Space isn’t at all about waiting passively for others to provide, but an action – sometimes even quite vigorous – towards that much-needed state of rest and restoration.
Continue readingTag Archives: autism research
Data-based study? – Whose data?
‘Data-based’ study – whose data?
(From: Dawn-joy Leong, Scheherazade’s Sea – autism, parallel embodiment and elemental empathy, 2016).
In 2014, I took part in a study conducted by a PhD researcher who claimed to specialise in aspects of physiological and psychological empathic and social motivation in autism. I was told in advance that the study would be about emotional vs. cognitive empathy. I remember thinking that I had read a few similar studies on this same subject, but couldn’t recall the exact titles of those papers. “Replication enforces truth,” I recall the words ‘auto-writing’ on my mental blackboard, for no apparent conscious reason. The laboratory was situated in a building tucked away behind another more prominent block. Continue reading