For long we have tried to describe what it means when a person is unable to organise and understand their intrinsic state. Whether this is a headache, poor sleep hygiene or a sore stomach, we know that our tolerances to various stimuli in our environments or events in our lives are significantly reduced. Interoception is defined as the ability to detect and attend to body sensations. This is achieved through a number of different sensors in our body which detect chemical composition of blood, blood pressure, pain receptors etc.
When considering all the other 7 senses our interpretation of one’s sensory preferences are often a subjective measure of one’s interpretation of another person’s sensory preferences. For myself it is something we need to make clear when completing a standardised or an unstandardized sensory assessment that one’s sensory preferences is influenced significantly by one’s intrinsic state. The best example given is when a person has a headache. One could normally tolerate loud noises coming from multiple people in an environment. When a person has a headache that level of tolerance significantly reduces. This can work the other way as well whereby a situation or event can stimulate excitability such as a player kicking a goal and your heart rate and adrenaline increases. This may lead to someone being unable to sit still and seek out more vigorous pressure and movement. This is the fantastic aspects to analyzing and providing advice on an individual’s sensory preferences and sensory integration needs.