The use of language in autism research

Ruth Monk; Andrew J O Whitehouse; Hannah Waddington

doi:10.1016/j.tins.2022.08.009

The use of language in autism research

Trends Neurosci. 2022 Nov;45(11):791-793. doi: 10.1016/j.tins.2022.08.009. Epub 2022 Sep 29.

Authors

Ruth Monk¹, Andrew J O Whitehouse², Hannah Waddington³

Affiliations

¹ Autism New Zealand Community Advisory Group, New Zealand/School of Medical Sciences, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand.
² Telethon Kids Institute, The University of Western Australia, Perth, WA, Australia. Electronic address: Andrew.Whitehouse@telethonkids.org.au.
³ School of Education, Victoria University of Wellington, Wellington, New Zealand.

PMID: 36184384
DOI: 10.1016/j.tins.2022.08.009

Abstract

The past three decades have seen a major shift in our understanding of the strong links between autism and identity. These developments have called for careful consideration of the language used to describe autism. Here, we briefly discuss some of these deliberations and provide guidance to researchers around language use in autism research.

Keywords: inclusion and diversity; neurodevelopment; neurodiversity; stigma; terminology.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Autism Spectrum Disorder*
Autistic Disorder*
Humans
Language