Hyper vs Hypo-reactivity to sensory input...

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We hear a lot about hyper-reactivity to sensory input, but far less about hypo-reactivity as listed in the DSM 5 criteria:

"Hyper-or hypo-reactivity to sensory input or unusual interest in sensory aspects of environment; (such as apparent indifference to pain/heat/cold, adverse response to specific sounds or textures, excessive smelling or touching of objects, fascination with lights or spinning objects)."

I wondered if you had any comments or experiences to relate on this?

In particular, for those who don't experience sensory overload, do you perhaps instead experienced reality less vividly than NTs?
Or is hypo-reactivity limited purely to sensations like pain and heat as described?

Last edited by Filipendula on 08 Jul 2012, 5:46 am, edited 1 time in total.

Definitely hyper-sensitive. Heat and cold can thoroughly mess up the part of my brain that keeps me relatively "with it", requiring me to explain to my friends why I'm not really sure where I'm going after spending too much time baking in a ninety degree scorcher of a day. I don't have as much of a sensitivity to sound or light, though, although I don't particularly like stepping out into bright sunlight or standing next to the speakers at a concert. Not sure how abnormal either of those are, though.

I have an unequal mixture. I'm fairly tolerant to pain, but very sensitive to light and temperature and most tactile sensations.

I sometimes put a lot effort into not displaying hyper-reactivity, and then I later wonder whether I was actually just displaying hypo-reactivity "naturally" or maybe even "shutting down" a bit in self-protection.

Anyone's emotional disturbance can seem as non-interesting to me as last week's weather, and yet I still try to get as far away from it as possible whenever I can.

I'm overall very hypersensitive, but also seeking. I however have hyposensitive traits and propioception and introception are primarily hyposensitive.

I am hypersensitive to stuff from the outside, e.g. light and sound. I am hyposensitive to stuff on the inside, e.g. hunger and thirst.

Introception tends to be the word used for that.

I'm hyposensitive to that stuff too.

Yeah, my introception is terrible. In that other topic, I could only feel about 1/3 of my heartbeats when I was totally still in a quiet room and holding my breath. While breathing, I would probably be lucky to feel 1/4 heartbeats. I never realized how unusual that apparently is until that topic. o_o

I've learned to read the physical reactions of my body to know when I'm hungry and thirsty. Something about the increased bodily awareness gained in my years of martial arts really increased my inner bodily awareness as well.

My hypersensitivity leads directly to my hypo sensitivity.

I had no idea there was a word for it. Thanks for that.

Me too then. The only thing is I tend to be fairly tolerant to pain and hypo sensitive to cold but hypersensitive to hot.

I am hyposenstive to it too.
I am hypersensitive to outside stimuli like sound, light, movement, colours.
I am hypersensitive to inside thoughts and feelings.
My body is hypersensitive to especially light touch and material of clothes, but some parts are hyposensitive to touch and pain.
As a child I would play outside in the winter with my sleeves up and blue frozen arms as I did not feel the cold, but I was hypersensitive to the feeling of clothes.
Weird somehow...

I actually don't know whether I'm hypo or hyper sensitive to things, but I do know that crowds and tight spaces (ex. bookshelves really close together) make me feel hot, which make me feel kind of irritable.

In one aspie quiz, the question regarding pain was, "Are you hyper or hypo sensitive to pain?"

I found another aspie quiz, but they asked the question better, as far as I was concerned. It asked, "Are you hyper or hyposensitive to pain? And do you mind it?" Like light and sound, I'm hypersensitive, and with pain, I don't mind it at all. Sometimes I bring it on myself, actually.

I'm hyper-sensitive to light, sound and touch, while being hypo-sensitive to pain, smell and taste.

But with each of those, I would probably add "most" or "some" to the front. It isn't like one sense is hyper or hypo when responding to everything.

I'm sensitive to very sudden loud noises, multiple people talking at once, quickly flashing lights (and light in general) and people touching me. In other respects though I can't smell well at all and often can't detect any scents in the room. So I'm kind of both, but more on the hyper side.

I'm hypersensitive to noise, touch, to a lesser degree light. But more when I'm exhausted.

I also only really exhibit symptoms of AS in force when I'm exhausted - enough so that people clearly seem to find me odd, not that I care much. I used to think this was because I'm better able to fake normalcy when I'm awake, well fed, etc, but I'm not positive on that anymore. Gotta reevaluate