Q&A on literacy needs for autistic students

At the Life Span Institute, the Comprehension and Language Learning (CALL) Lab is focused on understanding how people with developmental disabilities, especially autism, process spoken and written language with the goal to improve learning and job opportunities for these individuals. 

Meghan M. Davidson, Ph.D., is director of the CALL Lab, which is conducting a research project on understanding comprehension among autistic readers. Below, she explains reading and literacy needs in autistic students, including challenges and opportunities for support.

Q: Why is reading comprehension important? 

A: In general, reading skills help students achieve academically. Vocabulary, reading comprehension and problem solving are important for school success. Literacy skills also contribute to early college academics and can help increase job opportunities after school. 

Q: Why is reading and literacy important to autistic people in particular? 

A: Based on work by autistic researchers, reading is a safe way to learn more about neurotypical social rules through storytelling. This helps provide social simulation without the risk of failure. Autistic readers can develop social connections with fictional characters, which can help address loneliness and mental health difficulties. 

Q: How is reading comprehension different for children with autism? 

A: Autistic children tend to score higher in word reading ability but lower in reading comprehension. Non-autistic children who struggle with reading are more likely to struggle with word reading ability or decoding due to dyslexia than comprehension. 

Most of our schools are set up to identify students struggling with word reading abilities, which means they may be missing autistic kids who are experiencing challenges in comprehension. 

Autistic children who struggle with word reading ability tend to do so for different reasons than non-autistic children with dyslexia. They may be able to sound the word out but may not recognizing it as a word because they haven’t heard that word before, for example. 

Q: Can autistic people with higher support needs develop reading and literacy skills? 

A: Researchers know a lot more about the reading abilities of speaking autistic individuals than about those of autistic individuals who are AAC-users or non-speaking. Autistic individuals with low IQ scores can develop reasonably good reading skills if given the opportunity.  

We tend to have a bias that if individuals can’t speak or have lower intelligence, they can’t develop reading skills. However, it's a bias that probably shouldn't be there, because we see that, if an individual does get the right support, they actually can be quite successful in reading. 

For more information about participating in the CALL Lab’s research, visit the project page.