One of the challenges of executive dysfunction is the impact on self-awareness. How can we encourage someone to use strategies when they are unaware that there is something they need to compensate for? This can be evident in people who have hemispatial neglect after right posterior parietal lobe damage, who are unaware that they are not paying attention to the left side.
- Insight and awareness can be conceptualised as three interdependent domains (Pyramid Model of Self-awareness, Crosson et al., 1989):
- Intellectual awareness:The person knows they have a problem and can describe their difficulties
- Emergent awareness:The person knows they have a problem and are able to recognise the problem when it is actually happening
- Anticipatory awareness:The person anticipates that a problem will occur in advance of action, and makes deliberate compensatory plans.
Helpful information about working with poor insight or self-awareness can be found on the Headway website: lack-of-insight-after-brain-injury-factsheet.pdf (headway.org.uk)
