Making Sense of Multisensory Rooms for People with Learning Disabilities

Abstract

Clients' preferences for situations and stimuli were collected from exposure to a number of different environments before their responses were collected from the presentation of sensory stimuli. The aim of the study was to discern which novel stimuli were preferred by individual clients. Six clients with moderate learning disabilities were presented individually with a selection of sensory stimuli in a specially equipped multisensory room. Results showed the specific preferences of individual clients as well as overall stimuli preferences across clients. The systematic presentation of sensory stimuli to this client group enabled an objective evaluation of clients' preferences and facilitated clear feedback of information to keyworkers and care managers responsible for these clients.