Imagine this, upon entering a store, the rattling of shopping carts and the unexpected loudspeaker announcements stifle your ears. The fluorescent lights from above make you wince. To finish it off, every moment you try to flee the noise, it seems like the busy shopping crowds simply won’t disappear.
Though these shopping encounters are common, they can be painful and make shopping difficult for people with sensory disabilities. This back-to-school season, Walmart announced sensory hours every Saturday from 8 to 10 a.m. at some locations. So WBFO’s Mason Ald asked parents and neurodivergent adults if these sensory hours helped make shopping more accessible.
“When you hear that the Walmart’s are doing this, you should think about what you should try to do and definitely do. So, following through and having empathy and saying, ‘oh, this was a really great idea, and I'm going to comply with it,’ because it's going to affect the people in the community that use their store,” said Adriana Ragland, founder of the Neurodiversity Network of Western New York.
“So why not give back to the community and do this one thing that could really make a difference for someone?” said Ragland.
The term neurodiversity refers to how our brains operate differently, and people who identify as neurodivergent see their brains as operating in a way that is not considered "typical." Autistic people, people with ADHD, and other learning disabilities and mental health conditions may identify as being neurodivergent. Ragland, who has ADHD and has a son with autism, hopes Walmart’s sensory hours will help non-disabled people better understand her experience. She said her typical shopping experience is met with several distractions. As for shopping with her son, the bustling crowds are an overwhelming sensory experience.
“We always have his noise canceling headphones if it's overwhelming, but I think having a space to just go to where there's some relaxation items available and a calm space, that would make a huge difference in an overwhelming environment.” said Ragland.
Director of Advocacy for the Autistic Self Advocacy Network (ASAN) Zoe Gross agrees that an increase in sensory-friendly spaces, often called sensory rooms, in stores are much needed. Gross, who is autistic, explained that sensory overstimulation can feel painful to autistic people.
“Because of how our brains are different, we respond to sensory input differently,” said Gross. “And that means our pain threshold is lower. Everyone knows that if you play music, there's a point where you can play music until it becomes painful to most people, and it’s the same for us. It’s just at a lower volume that it becomes painful."
Though providing quiet sensory spaces or rooms in businesses is recommended by disability advocates, Gross said businesses may feel this would be difficult to implement due to lack of space. But sensory rooms provide a balance that hours don't. Dimming the lights across the store can cause a conflicting access need for people who are low vision. So a sensory room could honor both the needs of people with sensory disabilities and those with other access needs long term.
“They'll feel like we just don't have another room that we can use for that,” said Gross. “So that's something that maybe when you're building a new building we'd encourage places to look at, or something that places like airports can repurpose an existing room to implement.”
The value in implementing sensory rooms can also boil down to how invested companies may be in serving communities.
For Emily Mondschein, Executive Director of Buffalo’s GiGi’s Playhouse, an expectation to take people with disabilities into account at every store is ideal, though, she does not expect the world to change for her and her son, who has autism and Down Syndrome.
“Maybe one day, we will go to stores and there will be certain sections that are quiet and there will be all the lights that aren't hard for people to handle,” said Mondschein. “Maybe that will be the case, but I don't see it. So, I guess as a parent, I have to be realistic and do all I can on the day-to-day to prepare my son for a world that isn't sensory-friendly.”
For parents like Mondschein, preparing for a non-disabled world often means considering how exhausted children might be after engaging in certain environments. For example, if it’s hot out, a walk across the parking lot for her son may take a greater toll on his sensory sensitivity.
As her family continues to adapt to a world not built with her son in mind, Mondschein said she hopes businesses will start to adapt to their needs too.
“There's probably a lot of ways to make a store sensory friendly that no one would think twice about,” she said. “So why not just with the design? ADA is a great thing, but there's so much more to go now. It almost seems like there needs to be a new wave of ADA.”
Ragland agrees and thinks the push for sensory hours and rooms is an opportunity to increase equal access for people with sensory disabilities.
“People aren't making it up. And there are situations that are physically and emotionally overwhelming and limit people's ability to access things that we may take for granted every day, just like going to the grocery store. So, I think it's a great way for people to learn about other people's experiences,” she said.