Neurodivergent, By Nature by Joe Harkness: Why people with autism are at one with nature

When Joe Harkness was diagnosed with ADHD, the news came as a relief. Suddenly, the poor choices he’d made started to make sense. ‘Dropping out of sixth form and then college in consecutive years. Getting beaten up several times. Addiction. Debt... The inability to regulate my emotions.’

His wife was only too happy to list his many annoying qualities to the consultant making the diagnosis: how Harkness would never complete a task, never listened, and couldn’t focus on anything other than what was in front of him. ‘She was loving her time in the ADHD confessional box,’ he says wryly.

Even before this confirmation that his brain is ‘a bit messy’, Harkness had worked out that spending time in the natural world was essential to keeping on an even keel, representing a safe space for someone who often finds his surroundings noisy and confusing.

His particular love is birdwatching. For him, it is more than just a hobby: it’s ‘an immersive, multisensory activity that simultaneously stimulates and soothes our brains’.

Increasingly intrigued by what it means to be neurodivergent, a term that encompasses conditions such as autism, ADHD, dyslexia, dyspraxia and dyscalculia, Harkness investigates why green spaces are so vital to people who are neurodivergent, and what skills those people bring to conservation and the environment.

As he interviewed people who work in this sector, one quality made them stand out from the rest: their ability to focus obsessively on one thing, even if it’s something as unappealing as extracting DNA from the toe pads of long-dead parrots, or examining the genitalia of moths (which are as unique and varied as a fingerprint, apparently).

This ‘hyperfocus’ is commonly found in people with autism and ADHD, and while some describe it as ‘mentally and physically exhausting’, others regard it as a superpower.

Although it’s hard to measure since no one has compiled any accurate figures on it, Harkness believes that there’s an above-average representation of neurodivergent people in the conservation sector.

One RSPB area manager estimates that up to 30 per cent of the charity’s workforce are neurodivergent, and to Harkness this makes perfect sense. ‘Neurodivergent people… want to conserve the entity that understands us, that makes us feel safe, and gives us the escape we crave.’

Harkness writes movingly about how the rhythm of the seasons, and the predictability of the natural environment, act as a balm for those who are neurodivergent, offering a consistency that is lacking in so many other areas of life. He calls this ‘the web of wild wellbeing’.

In his own work as a teacher of young people with special educational needs, many of them neurodivergent, Harkness has noticed how their behaviour changes once they are out in the open. Children who have been excluded from school will take infinite care to rescue an injured butterfly, while the ‘cool kids’ work collaboratively with classmates they would usually ignore or belittle. Outdoors, ‘the pressure and containment of the traditional learning environment disappears’.