If your friend, partner, or family member is seeking an autism assessment, they may ask you to act as their informant. An informant is someone who helps an autism assessor understand how their client experiences the world.
By sharing your knowledge of the individual with a clinician, you'll give our team a fuller picture of their strengths and differences, which supports us in delivering a clinically robust autism assessment.
Who can be an informant?
To act as an informant for an autism assessment, you need to either:
- Have known the individual seeking an assessment well during childhood, be older than them, and still have regular contact with them.
Examples: a parent or caregiver.
OR:
- Have known the client well for at least three years, see them a couple of times a week, and ideally have lived with them for an extended period of time.
Examples: a partner, sibling, or close friend.
How does the informant process work?
Step one
As an informant, you'll need to complete an Informant Questionnaire. This includes questions about your loved one's:
- Early childhood.
- Developmental milestones.
- Medical and school history.
- Social and emotional experiences.
- Current presentation.
Step two
You will join an online session with a ProblemShared clinician:
- The session lasts around three hours. A link to join the session will be sent via email.
- It usually takes place at the same time as the client's observation session, but with a different clinician.
- It will be a semi-structured interview that focuses on the client's developmental history and their strengths and differences, including their cognitive, emotional, and social skills.
As an informant, it is really helpful if you can provide some examples and details where relevant.
Who can complete the Informant Questionnaire?
- A parent or carer.
- A partner.
- A close friend.
- A sibling.
- The client (especially if they are their own informant).
Ideally, both a caregiver and a partner or close friend would complete an Informant Questionnaire.
If you didn't raise the person seeking an autism assessment, or know them well during childhood, we ask that they complete their own copy of the Informant Questionnaire, too.
Your friend, partner, or family member can download and send out up to three copies of the questionnaire if more than one person is suitable to contribute to their assessment.
How to prepare for the Informant Interview
You may be wondering if there's anything you can do to prepare for your Informant Interview. Here are a few suggestions:
- Spend some time finding out more about autism and neurodiversity to help you understand what kind of questions you may be asked.
- Consider your friend or family member’s unique characteristics, strengths, and behaviours. It can help you provide more detailed and accurate information during your interview.
- If you have access to any physical documents that can help you provide the most accurate responses, such as educational records, gather them ahead of your interview.
- If possible, speak with the person who has asked you to be their informant before your Informant Interview. Find out if there's anything they'd sooner you didn't discuss during your interview, such as aspects of their personal life or medical history.
Finally, remember that by acting as an informant and providing accurate and reliable insights, you're helping your friend, partner, or family member on their journey to understand themselves better – regardless of the outcome of their assessment.
