Bilingualism research group

Speaker: Shereen Sharaan

Title: The Impact of Bilingualism on the Executive Functions of Autistic Children: A Study of English-Arabic Children

Abstract: There is evidence to suggest that certain executive function skills are impaired in autistic children, underlying several features of autism. There is also evidence to suggest that the regular use of two languages has the potential to extend executive function capacities. The evidence is mixed and there is very little research addressing how bilingualism might impact on those with neurodiverse conditions such as autism, with less than five studies published worldwide to date. The reality is, parents, therapists, and educators around the world lack sufficient evidence to support language decisions surrounding autistic children. Decisions surrounding language choices can impact vast aspects of autistic individuals' lives including therapeutic services, education services, employment opportunities, identity, and cognitive development.

We investigated the impact of bilingualism on the executive function abilities of Arabic-English autistic children and their typically developing peers, using a combination of direct tasks as well as informant-measures, capturing parent and teacher perspectives. 120 children aged 5-12 years, based in the United Arab Emirates, participated in this study. The findings indicate that bilingualism does not negatively impact the executive function skills of autistic children, and that in fact, it might mitigate difficulties in some executive function domains. This study goes beyond group-level analysis by incorporating a multiple case series approach at the level of individual participants to obtain rich information regarding performance range for each autistic participant. This is the first investigation at this interface to use Arabic-speaking populations and the first to include sustained attention.