Publication date: May 22, 2025

Autistic people are more likely to experience mental health problems such as anxiety disorder and depression than are the general population. This study reports a qualitative analysis of interview data provided by 12 psychological therapists regarding their experiences of working with autistic people with anxiety disorders and/or depression within a structured primary care mental health service in the north of England. Interviews were analysed using thematic analysis. Four main themes were identified: (1) Experience and Trepidation, (2) Wrong Service, Only Service, (3) Therapeutic Environment and (4) Training and Adaptations. Participating therapists identified challenges in the structure of the services they worked in, the applicability of conventional therapies and the need for autism-specific therapy training ideally led by autistic people. Centrally, participants did not routinely feel fully equipped to separate endemic aspects of autism itself from features of a mental health disorder in an autistic person, which had left some feeling powerless to help in certain cases, or as if they may have done more harm than good. All participants were, however, able to identify positive adaptations made from practical experience, and most reported a growing confidence in working with autistic people. Lay AbstractThe experiences of psychological therapists working with autistic people in a primary care service for anxiety disorders and depressionWe are a group of autistic people, academic researchers and psychological therapists, with some of us being more than one of those things. We started from the knowledge that autistic people are particularly prone to have anxiety disorders and depression. We were, therefore, interested in how current ‘talking therapy’ services in England might, or might not, be helping autistic people with those problems. To address this issue, we interviewed 12 psychological therapists in the north of England who had experience of working with autistic people with an anxiety disorder, depression or both. We found that the therapists often felt that they were not prepared or trained to give autistic people their best service. The therapists were also concerned that some of the therapies they usually applied did not always work with autistic people, or sometimes even made things worse. They felt it was important, however, that autistic people should keep using the service, as there was no other service available to them if they had an anxiety disorder or depression. There was evidence, however, that talking therapies still had positive effects for autistic people, and that therapists had therefore probably underestimated their positive impact in a lot of cases. Consequently, training was recommended such that psychological therapists might better understand mental health and specific therapy adaptations that help autistic people.

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