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In psychology and sociology, masking, also known as social camouflaging, is a defensive behavior in which an individual conceals their natural personality or behavior in response to social pressure, abuse, or harassment. Masking can be strongly influenced by environmental factors such as authoritarian parents, social rejection, and emotional abuse, physical abuse, or sexual abuse abuse.
Masking can be a behavior individuals adopt subconsciously as coping mechanisms or a trauma response, or it can be a conscious behavior an individual adopts to fit in within perceived societal norms. Masking is interconnected with maintaining Performativity behavior within social structures and cultures. Masking is mostly used to conceal a negative emotion (usually sadness, frustration, and anger) with a positive emotion or indifferent affect. Developmental studies have shown that this ability begins as early as preschool and becomes more developed with age.
The concept of masking is particularly developed in the understanding of Autistic masking. For individuals with autism, masking behaviors are sometimes automatic. They may not even realize that they are doing them. This is not always the case though, as some behaviors take constant effort and conscious social monitoring to maintain.
Masks represent an artificial face, in the "saving face" sense. Seeing life as theatre is the core of the closely related social perspectives of dramatism, dramaturgy and performativity. Masks are a tool of impression management and stigma management, which are parts of reputation management.
In the influential book The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life (1956), Erving Goffman emphasized the link between social life and performance. Reviews of camouflaging literature suggest that Goffman's theory of social performance is still key for explaining how masking helps people shape others' perceptions and handle stigma.
Frantz Fanon is credited with defining masking in his 1957 Black Skin, White Masks, which describes masking behavior in race relations within the stratified post-war United States. Fanon explained how African-Americans, especially those of low social capital, adopted certain behaviors to resemble white people as well as other behaviors intended to please whites and reinforce the white man's higher social status.
The term masking was used to describe the act of concealing disgust by Paul Ekman (1972) and Wallace V Friesen (1969). They thought of it as a learned behavior.
Lorna Wing proposed that females' higher levels of masking than males led to their underdiagnosing of having autism in 1981. (2026). 9781787755802, Jessica Kingsley Publishers. ISBN 9781787755802
The Camouflaging Autistic Traits Questionnaire (CAT-Q), which measures autistic masking, was published by Laura Hull, Simon Baron-Cohen and others in March 2019. Recent validity testing suggests that while the CAT-Q demonstrates measurement stability across age groups, further research is needed to investigate how cultural and age-related differences may impact its ability to properly measure populations in different countries.
Masking can increase loneliness. In particular, some autistic individuals report that it impedes them forming real connections with other people, and many feel as if they have lost their true identity as an autistic individual, feeling as if they are only playing a role for the majority of their lives.
Though there are many disadvantages to masking for individuals, many report the benefits masking has brought for them. Such reports stated that individuals felt as though it became easier to socialize, to uphold careers, build relationships, and even at times, were able to protect themselves.
This causes autism in females to be underdiagnosed relative to males.American Psychiatric Association (2026). 9780890425756, American Psychiatric Association. ISBN 9780890425756 In turn, females with unrecognised autism do not receive social allowances for this condition, increasing their motivation to mask. Additionally, reviews indicate that Patient Access Network (PAN) research mainly involves white, adult females without intellectual disabilities, pointing to the importance of including more demographically diverse participants to broaden findings.
As briefly mentioned in the "Causes" section above, recent research compares autistic masking and cultural adaptation strategies such as code-switching or frame-switching used by immigrants or individuals of cultural minorities. In these cases, a person may alter their communication style, emotional expressions, or behavior to be in compliance with the majority culture's rules at the expense of their own culture. These modifications can be made unconsciously or consciously and are usually motivated by factors of safety or pressures of professional, academic or social acceptability.
It has been discovered by some research that the relationship between masking and mental health is not necessarily so straightforward. Certain collectivist (see Social organization) cultures were discovered to have worse mental health outcomes from minimal or high-level masking, making moderate levels more practical. This suggests that the process of masking (and its psychological impact) is not just an individual consideration but also based on overall cultural norms and public opinion. These findings emphasize the importance of realizing that social camouflaging is shaped by local values surrounding identity, difference, and belonging. Therefore, cultural practices and beliefs can directly impact the relationship between levels of masking and their psychological effects, rather than it being directly linear.
For those with autism, the ways people engage in masking behaviors can be different depending on cultural context. In collectivist cultures, social cohesion and conformity are more valued. These pressures may compel people with autism to suppress non-conformity behaviors even when they do not explicitly recognize such behaviors as being linked to their neurodivergence. In contrast, more individualist cultures of Western countries may foster varying reasons for camouflaging, such as one's desire to "fit in" with a group. Both circumstances may suppress identity, but differ slightly in the motivations and thought processes behind them. Social stigmatization of autism also varies across cultures and can strongly influence the amount of pressure on people to camouflage characteristics. In places where acceptance and understanding of autism are low, there can be more pressure to appear "normal" that creates more harmful or more intense masking.
Typical examples of autistic masking include the suppression of stimming and meltdowns, a common reaction to sensory overload. To compensate difficulties in social interaction with non-autistic peers, autistic people might maintain eye contact despite discomfort, use rehearsed conversational scripts, or mirror the body language and tone of others.
This masking often requires an exceptional effort. It is linked with adverse mental health outcomes such as stress, autistic burnout, Anxiety disorder and other psychological disorders, loss of identity, and suicidality. Some studies find that compensation strategies are seen as contributing to leading a successful and satisfactory life. However, experts caution that promoting camouflaging without addressing its psychological impacts could unintentionally cause negative mental health outcomes.
A 2021 study found masking experiences between autistic and non-autistic groups were similar, but only autistic people masked autism-specific symptoms. Masking has been linked to confusion about personal identity among these individuals, who can start to have trouble distinguishing their authentic qualities from the personas they have adopted to conform.
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