Attune & Stimulate: Supporting external emotion regulation of persons with severe to profound intellectual disabilities

Persons with severe to profound intellectual disabilities usually rely on their parents and/or professional caregivers for adequate emotion regulation, which is important for their quality of life and emotional well-being. A key quality of parents and professional caregivers in externally regulating emotions is sensitive responsiveness, which is challenged by the subtle, idiosyncratic, and atypical emotional expressions of persons with severe to profound intellectual disabilities. The main purpose of this doctoral dissertation was to provide more insight into how emotional states in persons with severe to profound intellectual disabilities can be observed and adequately interpreted and regulated. In this doctoral dissertation, the low-intensity, brief, and selfadministered Attune & Stimulate-checklist was developed, aimed at improving sensitive responsiveness of parents and professional caregivers. The randomized controlled trial showed large effects on sensitive responsiveness and affective behaviour of professional caregivers, and medium effects on the emotional state and interactive engagement of persons with severe to profound intellectual disabilities. To widen access to the tool for implementation purposes, the Attune & Stimulate-app was developed in co-creation with parents and professionals. The evaluation of the Attune & Stimulate-app revealed that it might accelerate the long-term and intensive processes of learning to ‘read’ the emotional expressions of persons with severe to profound intellectual disabilities.