Barriers to ND Adaptation in Care Staff Why It Happens and How to Fix It

The Hidden Cost of Staff Resistance

You can have the best care plans on file, but they mean very little if they aren’t lived out on shift.

For managers and leaders in supported accommodation, trying to embed trauma-responsive, neurodiversity-informed practice while staff revert to rigid or punitive responses is exhausting. It creates a familiar cycle:

A young person escalates →
staff fall back on control →
trust erodes →
incidents increase →
placements destabilise →
and leadership is left explaining outcomes to inspectors and commissioners.

This isn’t about “difficult staff” or unwillingness to care.

In most cases, resistance is a stress response driven by psychological, neurological and cultural barriers that make adaptation feel unsafe for staff.

To fix resistance, we need to understand why it shows up.

Key Takeaways

• The social expectation gap: When young people with ADHD or ASD don’t respond with expected social cues (eye contact, compliance, tone), staff can unconsciously interpret this as disrespect or defiance.

• Identity threat: Shifting from behaviour-led to trauma-responsive care can feel like a rejection of staff’s previous training and experience.

• Fear of permissiveness: Low-arousal approaches are often misunderstood as “letting things slide,” triggering anxiety about loss of control.

• The cortisol effect: Stressed, burned-out staff lose access to reflective thinking making co-regulation neurologically harder.

• Structure reduces fear: Clear, shared frameworks (like SPARK Care™) replace ambiguity with safety, reducing reliance on control.

 

The Psychology Behind Resistance

Why is adapting to neurodivergent needs hard for staff?

Most staff are operating from neurotypical social expectations, even without realising it.

Human brains are wired to expect certain signals to feel safe in relationships:

• eye contact

• verbal acknowledgment

• compliance

• emotional reciprocity

When a young person with ADHD or ASD doesn’t provide these cues because of processing differences, sensory overload or emotional shutdown the staff member’s nervous system can interpret this as threat or rejection.

Without support, the body moves into defence:

• firmer tone

• stricter rules

• increased demands

Not because staff don’t care but because their own sense of safety has been disrupted.

What causes resistance to trauma-responsive practice?

Resistance often stems from fear and identity protection, not unwillingness.

Many experienced support workers were trained in systems where:

• authority equalled safety

• compliance equalled success

• consequences were the main tool

When trauma-responsive approaches are introduced without support, it can feel like:

• “Everything I’ve done is wrong”

• “I’m losing control”

• “This will turn into chaos”

To protect their confidence and professional identity, staff may dismiss new approaches rather than risk feeling incompetent.

How mindset gaps affect behaviour interpretation

When staff lack neurodiversity-informed frameworks, behaviour is more likely to be misread.

Without that lens:

• distress looks like defiance

• shutdown looks like laziness

• avoidance looks like manipulation

With training and structure:

• distress is recognised as overload

• escalation is understood as loss of regulation

• support replaces punishment

This shift changes everything from the language used to the outcome of the interaction.

 

How to Reduce Barriers and Support Staff Adaptation

1. Audit the “unwritten rules” of your culture

Pay attention to what is implicitly rewarded.

If staff are praised for:

• “quiet shifts”

• “no incidents”

• “keeping control”

…you may be reinforcing compliance over regulation.

Shift the language toward:

• regulated environments

• successful co-regulation

• completed repair after conflict

What you praise is what your team repeats.

2. Embed trauma-responsive supervision

Supervision should support reflection, not just accountability.

Move beyond:

- “What happened?”

Toward:

- “What was happening in your body at that moment?”

- “What signals did the young person give before escalation?“

- What helped and what didn’t?”

This separates staff emotion from young person behaviour and builds emotional literacy across the team.

3. Require the “why,” not just the “what”

Incident reports that only describe behaviour reinforce blame.

Support staff to identify:

• triggers

• sensory load

• unmet needs

• transition points

When the function of behaviour becomes standard practice, reactive responses reduce naturally.

 

Final Thought

Neurodiversity-informed care doesn’t fail because staff don’t care.
It fails when systems expect people to adapt without safety, structure or support.

When leaders replace ambiguity with shared frameworks, resistance softens, confidence grows and care becomes consistent. Not because staff are forced to change, but because it finally feels safe to do so.

 

Frequently Asked Questions

Why do staff revert to punitive responses under stress?

High stress floods the nervous system with cortisol, reducing access to reflective thinking. In these moments, people default to their oldest learned responses, often authority, based or punitive even if they intellectually know better.

This is why structure and rehearsal matter more than knowledge alone.

Can training actually change this?

Yes. When training is practical and embodied.

Framework-based training (like SPARK Care™) gives staff:

• a shared language

• predictable steps

• permission to slow down

This reduces fear and restores confidence during high-pressure moments.

Is resistance a sign of a “bad” support worker?

No.

Resistance is often a signal of:

• burnout

• fear of failure

• lack of psychological safety

Supporting staff regulation is often the first step toward improving care for young people.

What’s the biggest barrier to reflective learning?

Blame culture.

If staff believe reflection leads to discipline, they will defend instead of learn. Psychological safety, where mistakes are treated as information, is essential for any trauma-responsive model to work.

 

Author Bio

This article was written by Ash Derges, founder of AshDHD Learning. Ash grew up in care and later worked in supported accommodation and children’s residential services, progressing from frontline support to assistant management. As a neurodivergent practitioner with ADHD, she understands both the lived experience of care and the operational pressures faced by staff. Ash now develops neuro-smart, trauma-responsive frameworks that help teams reduce escalation, stabilise placements and build consistent, dignified support for young people aged 16–18.