Shannan Palma: Easing neurodivergent mental load with AI

About this episode

Shannan Palma discusses her journey and the development of AI tools to support neurodivergent individuals.

Episode 199 with Shannan Palma. “Sometimes I know exactly what to do — but I just can’t make my body do it. And then comes the shame spiral, the anger, the anxiety.” Shannan is the founder and CEO of ITI Assistive Technologies and co-leader of the Autistic Self-Reliance Support Network (ASR). Shannan is autistic and has ADHD, and she’s building the kinds of tools she wished had existed when she was struggling most. Prior to her dual diagnosis, Shannan was a professor who left academia due to severe burnout. After her diagnosis, she started looking for resources and support, but soon recognized a huge gap in support for autistic and ADHD adults — especially when it came to executive functioning and decision-making. In this episode, Shannan and I discuss: Shannan’s path from academia to diagnosis and advocacy Her AI-powered decision support app Decide , designed specifically for neurodivergent brains by a team of autistic and ADHD developers How AI tools can support the mental load of neurodivergent life The concept of “bottom-up” processing in neurodivergent brains The urgent need for adult-focused research and how the tojisha-kenkyu method of self-directed research can be used…

People in this episode

Host: Katy Weber

Guest: Shannan Palma

Topics covered

• neurodivergent mental load
• AI tools
• executive functioning
• autism advocacy
• decision-making support

Keywords

• ADHD
• autism
• mental load
• AI
• decision support
• executive functioning
• neurodivergent

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: ITI Assistive Technologies, Autistic Self-Reliance Support Network

Products: Decide

Books & works: The Kiss Quotient

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