Calm rooms and sensory walls in malls can make the difference for parents with special children -Photo from Sunway Putra Mall’s website
PETALING JAYA: Introducing autistic-friendly facilities such as calm rooms and sensory walls in shopping malls can be life changing for families with autistic individuals.
As Jennifer Peters, a speech-language therapist and parent of a child with autism, puts it, taking children with autism out, particularly to malls where loud sounds and too many movements could spark a sensory overload, is not as easy as it may seem.
“When my daughter was younger, her sensory inputs got overloaded quite quickly during mall trips. There is much noise and so much movement with various colours and lights that could cause a meltdown,” Jennifer told theSun in conjunction with World Autism Day today.