Writing the literature review was the point where the earlier planning around thematic structure became useful.

Rather than working through sources one by one, I organised the section around the areas that directly support the report argument.

Neurodiversity, Accessibility and Individual Variability

The opening section establishes the wider position through neurodiversity and disability models.

Doyle and Dwyer are useful here because they help move the discussion away from locating difficulty only within the individual. The interaction between personal characteristics and environmental conditions is much more relevant to an accessibility project.

This section also introduces heterogeneity. If autistic experience is not uniform, then a standardised accessibility response immediately becomes something that needs questioning.

Independence, Autonomy and Support

The second section focuses on what independence actually means.

Bhattacharya et al. and Thompson-Hodgetts et al. helped me challenge the assumption that independence requires completing a journey without support.

Instead, independence can include assistance while still preserving choice, agency and control.

This becomes important later because the project is not trying to remove support. It is trying to explore support that does not unnecessarily reduce autonomy.

Sensory Processing and Airport Accessibility

The next section brings sensory research into the airport context.

MacLennan's work became important because it shows that sensory experience is influenced by more than individual stimuli. Predictability, space, opportunities for adjustment, perceived control and recovery can all affect the experience.

Airport-specific studies from Edwards et al. and Castro, Batista and Andrada then help connect this to real accessibility systems.

This allowed me to move from a simple argument about "loud airports" towards a more complex sensoryscape.

Physiological Sensing and Responsive Support

The final section introduces physiological sensing, HRV, biofeedback and bioresponsive technology.

I needed to be especially critical here because the evidence does not support a claim that one biosignal can directly identify sensory overload.

The strongest position is that physiological information may provide another source of information about changing arousal, but it needs to be interpreted alongside baseline, context and user control.

The technology section only works if it follows the accessibility problem rather than replacing it.

Keeping the Review Critical

Throughout the section I tried to avoid presenting every source as equally strong or equally relevant.

A study can be useful while still being limited by sample size, context or methodology. A technology paper can establish possibility without proving that the same approach will work for autistic travellers in airports.

The literature review therefore needed to keep asking what each paper contributes and where its usefulness stops.

What the Review Now Does

The review now builds a sequence from individual variability, to autonomy, to sensory regulation, to the possibility of responsive support.

The literature review is no longer a record of what I read; it is the evidence base that makes the later design proposition logically possible.