Charting the impact of bilingualism on development in children with and without autism spectrum disorders
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Edinburgh
Department Name: Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences
Abstract
Many children in the UK grow up in homes where more than one language is spoken. Understanding the effect of this 'bilingual exposure' on children's abilities is challenging, but research so far largely shows that learning more than one language does not hinder child development, and can be beneficial. As well as the obvious advantage of knowing two languages, bilingualism has been associated with better insight into the thoughts and feelings of others. Other skills are hotly contested by researchers but may include greater ability to switch between tasks and control behaviour. These skills are useful both in the classroom, and in the playground.
We know much less about how hearing two languages affects the development of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). ASD is associated with difficulties with communication, relating to other people and a desire for repetition and routine. Many practitioners and parents have reported that they are concerned that difficulties linked to autism, especially in communication, may be made worse if a child uses or hears more than one language. In addition, it is often assumed that speaking two languages is too taxing for a child who has an intellectual disability - which applies to about half of all children with ASD.
However these assumptions are untested. Fifty years ago, it was also assumed that growing up in a bilingual home was a bad idea for all children, and yet we now know that that is untrue. Might it therefore also be the case that hearing or speaking more than one language is also OK for children with ASD? And, more speculatively, could bilingualism even create learning opportunities in the autistic population? After all, the benefits linked to bilingualism (like better insight into other people's minds) are in the same areas as those which are often impaired in autism.
This project will provide unique, valuable information about how bilingual exposure affects both children with autism and their non-autistic peers. We will recruit about 180 children aged 4-12 years for a comprehensive assessment at two time points, one year apart. Children will all come from bilingual households but amount and type of exposure will vary widely, as will their confidence speaking each language. This will allow us to identify the impact of hearing, learning and speaking two languages on developmental change and learning in both groups. Our tests will focus on characteristics of autism, as well as skills which could be linked to a bilingual advantage. Drawing on our own previous work in this area, in which we interviewed bilingual parents of children with autism, we will also assess the social and family consequences of bilingualism such as impact on quality of life, community integration and access to services.
In order to properly understand how bilingualism affects children with intellectual disability (who may have a very small spoken vocabulary and whose understanding may be hard to measure accurately) we will also develop new ways to measure language using recordings of eye movements instead of traditional tests.
During this project we will create:
- knowledge about the role of hearing and speaking more than one language on development and learning, in children with autism and without;
- a contribution to theories about how children learn language, and to psychological models of autism;
- evidence-based guidelines for parents, teachers and therapists;
- new ways to research language in children with learning disability
In particular, seeing the same children at two appointments, one year apart, with thorough assessment by a team of experts at each meeting, and including children with a range of types of language experience can address many of the key questions in bilingualism research. Moreover, the study will provide hints about whether exposure to more than one language at a young age could provide a natural learning opportunity for children with autism.
We know much less about how hearing two languages affects the development of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). ASD is associated with difficulties with communication, relating to other people and a desire for repetition and routine. Many practitioners and parents have reported that they are concerned that difficulties linked to autism, especially in communication, may be made worse if a child uses or hears more than one language. In addition, it is often assumed that speaking two languages is too taxing for a child who has an intellectual disability - which applies to about half of all children with ASD.
However these assumptions are untested. Fifty years ago, it was also assumed that growing up in a bilingual home was a bad idea for all children, and yet we now know that that is untrue. Might it therefore also be the case that hearing or speaking more than one language is also OK for children with ASD? And, more speculatively, could bilingualism even create learning opportunities in the autistic population? After all, the benefits linked to bilingualism (like better insight into other people's minds) are in the same areas as those which are often impaired in autism.
This project will provide unique, valuable information about how bilingual exposure affects both children with autism and their non-autistic peers. We will recruit about 180 children aged 4-12 years for a comprehensive assessment at two time points, one year apart. Children will all come from bilingual households but amount and type of exposure will vary widely, as will their confidence speaking each language. This will allow us to identify the impact of hearing, learning and speaking two languages on developmental change and learning in both groups. Our tests will focus on characteristics of autism, as well as skills which could be linked to a bilingual advantage. Drawing on our own previous work in this area, in which we interviewed bilingual parents of children with autism, we will also assess the social and family consequences of bilingualism such as impact on quality of life, community integration and access to services.
In order to properly understand how bilingualism affects children with intellectual disability (who may have a very small spoken vocabulary and whose understanding may be hard to measure accurately) we will also develop new ways to measure language using recordings of eye movements instead of traditional tests.
During this project we will create:
- knowledge about the role of hearing and speaking more than one language on development and learning, in children with autism and without;
- a contribution to theories about how children learn language, and to psychological models of autism;
- evidence-based guidelines for parents, teachers and therapists;
- new ways to research language in children with learning disability
In particular, seeing the same children at two appointments, one year apart, with thorough assessment by a team of experts at each meeting, and including children with a range of types of language experience can address many of the key questions in bilingualism research. Moreover, the study will provide hints about whether exposure to more than one language at a young age could provide a natural learning opportunity for children with autism.
Planned Impact
The proposed research was motivated by a series of approaches made to Bilingualism Matters (a research and information centre at the University of Edinburgh) by both parents and practitioners asking for information about autism and bilingualism. We undertook an initial exploratory, qualitative study which has informed our research questions and study design, ensuring direct relevance for stakeholders.
Principal beneficiaries will be: 1) autistic people and their families, 2) practitioners in health, education and social care; 3) policy-makers. For each group we will ensure impact via direct engagement, knowledge exchange and open dissemination activities. Specific examples are provided below.
Autistic people and their families: We will circulate newsletters and report on specific issues via the DART blog (www.dart.ed.ac.uk/blog), reaching study participants and other local stakeholders. In addition we will recruit three stakeholder representatives to act as advisors on the project, ensuring that research is respectful and meaningful to the participating communities, and that outputs have maximum relevance to interested parties. At the mid-point and the end of the study we will host a tea party for families to share the results which will be converted into accessible information, such as infographics for key findings, and disseminated online and direct to community organisations such as Lothian Autistic Society and Scottish Autism.
Practitioners in health, education and social care: Longitudinal data is of particular relevance to clinicians working in autism assessment teams, contributing to the evidence base for appropriate therapeutic intervention. We will combine our new findings with the latest information from the literature and use this collected body of evidence to inform an online lecture designed to help practitioners make evidence-based recommendations on bilingualism for children with autism. In addition, the research team will aim to provide similar lectures, tailored to the specific professional audience, to local groups, for example at the annual NHS Lothian Community Child Health In-Service meeting. In addition, new information derived from our control group participants will feed into existing dissemination activities to mainstream practitioners (e.g. school teachers) via Bilingualism Matters. Examples include talks, workshops and downloadable factsheets.
Policy-makers: As above, the new findings provided by our research, pertaining to the consequences for bilingual exposure on typical children's learning, social skills and community participation will feed into existing partnerships between Bilingualism Matters (BM) and national and local government. Our outputs will be targeted to those commissioning services for children with English as an additional language as well as those with additional support needs arising from autism or other neuro-developmental disorders. In addition, this project will extend existing BM relationships to include a new partnership with the Scottish government's Autism Strategy governance group.
Principal beneficiaries will be: 1) autistic people and their families, 2) practitioners in health, education and social care; 3) policy-makers. For each group we will ensure impact via direct engagement, knowledge exchange and open dissemination activities. Specific examples are provided below.
Autistic people and their families: We will circulate newsletters and report on specific issues via the DART blog (www.dart.ed.ac.uk/blog), reaching study participants and other local stakeholders. In addition we will recruit three stakeholder representatives to act as advisors on the project, ensuring that research is respectful and meaningful to the participating communities, and that outputs have maximum relevance to interested parties. At the mid-point and the end of the study we will host a tea party for families to share the results which will be converted into accessible information, such as infographics for key findings, and disseminated online and direct to community organisations such as Lothian Autistic Society and Scottish Autism.
Practitioners in health, education and social care: Longitudinal data is of particular relevance to clinicians working in autism assessment teams, contributing to the evidence base for appropriate therapeutic intervention. We will combine our new findings with the latest information from the literature and use this collected body of evidence to inform an online lecture designed to help practitioners make evidence-based recommendations on bilingualism for children with autism. In addition, the research team will aim to provide similar lectures, tailored to the specific professional audience, to local groups, for example at the annual NHS Lothian Community Child Health In-Service meeting. In addition, new information derived from our control group participants will feed into existing dissemination activities to mainstream practitioners (e.g. school teachers) via Bilingualism Matters. Examples include talks, workshops and downloadable factsheets.
Policy-makers: As above, the new findings provided by our research, pertaining to the consequences for bilingual exposure on typical children's learning, social skills and community participation will feed into existing partnerships between Bilingualism Matters (BM) and national and local government. Our outputs will be targeted to those commissioning services for children with English as an additional language as well as those with additional support needs arising from autism or other neuro-developmental disorders. In addition, this project will extend existing BM relationships to include a new partnership with the Scottish government's Autism Strategy governance group.
Publications
Davis R
(2021)
Autistic People's Access to Bilingualism and Additional Language Learning: Identifying the Barriers and Facilitators for Equal Opportunities
in Frontiers in Psychology
Davis R
(2023)
Measuring the Relationship between Bilingual Exposure and Social Attentional Preferences in Autistic Children
in Languages
Davis R
(2021)
What Do New Findings About Social Interaction in Autistic Adults Mean for Neurodevelopmental Research?
in Perspectives on psychological science : a journal of the Association for Psychological Science
Davis R
(2022)
Why study bilingualism in autistic people?
in Autism : the international journal of research and practice
Davis R
(2023)
Autism and bilingualism: A thematic analysis of practitioner perspectives in the United Kingdom.
in International journal of language & communication disorders
Title | Animated recruitment video |
Description | This short animated film presents the research and invites participants to join, while addressing some common questions they may have. |
Type Of Art | Film/Video/Animation |
Year Produced | 2018 |
Impact | Shared widely on social media, led to recruitment. |
URL | https://vimeo.com/292114445 |
Description | New knowledge generated: The key finding from the data analysed and published to date, is that bilingual exposure does not negatively impact social attentional skills or aspects of executive function skills for autistic children. The research also provides early indicators for the possibility of developmental gains for children with higher levels of bilingual exposure in some domains. This is the first study to date to assess the 'dose-dependent' effects of bilingual exposure - by recruiting children with variable experiences of bilingual exposure (from minimal use of a second language in any setting, versus near-exclusive use of a minority language in the home). As a result of using these methods, we found that increased levels of bilingual exposure positively affected some executive function skills for example, while not for other skills, such as social attention. Social attention and executive function skills were selected as domains of interest as these are areas that autistic are shown to struggle in compared to their non-autistic peers. The tasks that were used in this study, for example, have historically demonstrated that autistic children are consistently outperformed by non-autistic children, but are also areas in which bilingualism could have positive effects on performance. Across tasks in these two cognitive domains, we did not find any group differences between autistic and non-autistic children. The fact that an autistic disadvantage is often found in tasks but not in our sample of participants subject to bilingual exposure, may suggest a bilingualism effect compensating autistic difficulties. Our ongoing longitudinal analyses will further shed light on this potential compensatory effect. New or improved research methods developed: We successfully developed four novel eye tracker-based assessments of cognitive and language development to provide a detailed examination of subtleties in social cognition and executive function. Crucially, this allowed us to recruit minimally verbal children and children with intellectual disability (ID) in the study, two groups who are frequently excluded from developmental research due to inaccessible methods. A total of 15% of participants in the autistic group had a language delay or ID. This not only allowed us to to include a wide range of children in the study, but our methods and analysis techniques will also be made open-access later this year for researchers to adopt and use in future research. By using novel and accessible methodologies to recruit a wide range of children consistently excluded from research, we recruited the largest number of children and are the only study to focus on the dose-dependent effects of bilingualism. Taken together, our dataset represents an ecologically valid sample of participants, representative of autistic bilingual families in the UK. Key findings to date have been published in world-leading autism and bilingualism journals (see publications) and have contributed to policy and stakeholder evidence bases, fulfilling a key aim of this study (please see narrative impact for more information). Further findings will be published over the next 1-2 years and all methods will be available alongside the generated data for future collaborations and for use by other researchers. |
Exploitation Route | Our published data may be used by research teams to examine this unique population of autistic bilingual children in terms of their language, cultural, cognitive and behavioural profiles. Our new scientific discoveries can inspire new lines of enquiry regarding the impact of bilingualism in autistic children, and children in general. in addition, the impact of bilingualism in our sample is evidence of the malleability of autistic children's development and their capacity for learning and change, without a normalisation agenda. This can drive new lines of enquiry about autism, development, and education. Finally our methods can be deployed by researchers examining cognitive capacities in ways the allow for inclusion of a wide-range of intellectual abilities. For further details of the impact of our findings outside academic please see our response to the "Narrative Impact" section. |
Sectors | Communities and Social Services/Policy,Education,Healthcare,Culture, Heritage, Museums and Collections |
Description | The impact from these findings is ongoing and will continue over the next 24 months as the research findings continue to be published. However, to date, we have generated novel insights and knowledge demonstrated in a raft of outputs that are of direct relevant to the public and policy: 1. We published the largest prospective database of data from autistic bilingual children worldwide. This database is innovative in a number of additional ways: - It is the only dataset to include longitudinal data from two visits, one year apart (where data collection was not interrupted by Covid-19). - The dataset consists of a comprehensive task battery spanning executive function skills, language skills, social cognition, IQ, family demographics, standardised assessments and innovative and assessments tasks using eye tracking techniques. - By creating tasks that did not require verbal responses, we were able to recruit children with intellectual disabilities/ children who are minimally verbal, who are frequently excluded from research due to lack of accessibility. This dataset is openly available and free to download and use, and we have had several additional requests from researchers to analyse the data alongside their own research. 2. One of the key aims of this study was to be able to provide stakeholders (families, practitioners and stakeholders) with a substantive evidence-base regarding a child's linguistic environment. It also became apparent during the project that our research needed to highlight that autistic children should have access to their cultural and linguistic identities as a fundamental human right. To address these aims, the findings from this study have contributed to a series of policy briefings and guidelines for stakeholders. First, a policy briefing regarding the cognitive benefits of autism and bilingualism: https://www.mindroom.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Briefing-5-Autism-and-Bilingualism.pdf Second, we have also contributed to the running of a webinar for practitioners that led to the production of autism and bilingualism resources for parents. These guidelines have now been translated into 10 languages; https://autism-bilingualism.github.io/resources/ and is now endorsed by the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists. 3. As a result of the academic publications resulting from this research project, we have received additional funding to complete a complementary, qualitative study with autistic bilingual children. As a part of this, we have successfully fostered an international partnership with Autism Europe, the largest autism network in Europe, to disseminate accessible research findings to their stakeholder networks worldwide. |
First Year Of Impact | 2021 |
Sector | Communities and Social Services/Policy,Education,Healthcare |
Impact Types | Policy & public services |
Description | Member of Advisory group led by a Scottish charity, Inspiring Scotland, and scottish government, focused on increasing understanding of autism in Scotland. |
Geographic Reach | National |
Policy Influence Type | Participation in a guidance/advisory committee |
Description | Ongoing collaboration and partnerships with the project advisory group. Members include autistic individuals, parents of autistic children, practitioners and researchers, providing expertise and input. |
Geographic Reach | Local/Municipal/Regional |
Policy Influence Type | Participation in a guidance/advisory committee |
Description | Autism and Bilingualism, public engagement funding via the University of Edinburgh CMVM Public Engagement with Research Seed Fund |
Amount | £1,500 (GBP) |
Organisation | University of Edinburgh |
Sector | Academic/University |
Country | United Kingdom |
Start | 04/2021 |
End | 06/2021 |
Description | College and Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences Knowledge Exchange and Impact grant |
Amount | £6,000 (GBP) |
Organisation | University of Edinburgh |
Sector | Academic/University |
Country | United Kingdom |
Start | 06/2022 |
End | 06/2023 |
Description | Understanding the impact of bilingualism for autistic children. |
Amount | € 49,808 (EUR) |
Funding ID | Project ref: APa2020_02 |
Organisation | FIRAH - Fondation Internationale de la Recherche Appliquée sur le Handicap |
Sector | Charity/Non Profit |
Country | France |
Start | 03/2022 |
End | 03/2023 |
Description | University of Edinburgh, UKRI Covid-19 Mitigation Funding |
Amount | £22,500 (GBP) |
Organisation | University of Edinburgh |
Sector | Academic/University |
Country | United Kingdom |
Start | 01/2021 |
End | 07/2021 |
Title | Autism research passport contributions |
Description | Protocols created for the project (including recruitment documents) have been included in a new tool; an autism specific research passport. The project is being run by the Centre for Research in Autism and Education and our documents were requested for inclusion. |
Type Of Material | Improvements to research infrastructure |
Year Produced | 2020 |
Provided To Others? | No |
Impact | A Research Passport will help more people feel more welcome and comfortable when taking part in research. It will help to reduce worries about researchers not knowing about their needs. A Research Passport will also allow researchers to make changes to their research processes and adjust communications styles so that everyone can be heard and the study can be a success. This will be available in 2020. |
Title | Charting the Impact of Autism and Bilingualism for Autistic and Non-Autistic Children |
Description | The overall aim of this research is to ask how growing up in a bilingual environment affects the linguistic, cognitive and social development of children and, importantly, do these developmental effects differ for children with autism spectrum disorders. Here we collected data from autistic and non-autistic children at two timepoints, one year apart, (November 2018 - September 2020) in order to understand the influence of bilingual exposure on changes in cognitive development. Data is split into: - Demographic information (including language profile) and diagnostic criteria that are the same for timepoints 1 and 2 - Standardised cognitive assessments from timepoint and parent reports from timepoints 1 and 2 (executive functions, vocabulary, IQ, social cognition) - Computer based tasks measuring aspects of executive functions at timepoints 1 and 2 - Eyetracking tasks measuring: theory of mind and social attentional preferences, from timepoints 1 and 2. * See Readme file for instructions on how to access different files. * See protocol for detail regarding the project timeline, participants, and task battery/ data available. * See "Task information files" folder for more detailed information about each task (and matching dataset). This includes any preprints and peer reviewed articles where we have analysed some of this data, or journal articles from which we have (with permission) used stimuli or a task protocol. |
Type Of Material | Database/Collection of data |
Year Produced | 2022 |
Provided To Others? | Yes |
Impact | Data has currently produced three peer-reviewed publications in our group, with two more publications expected this year. Data has been requested from postgraduate Psychology students at the University of Edinburgh for analysis, with plans for future publication. |
URL | https://reshare.ukdataservice.ac.uk/855431/ |
Description | Invited membership to the Quantifying Bilingual Experience (Q-BEx) consortium |
Organisation | University of Leeds |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | Dr Davis was invited to participate as a member of the Q-BEx consortium, whose aim is to gain understand how beast to quantify bilingal experiences in research and in clinical settings. Experts including researchers and practitioners were invited to join to consortium. Dr Davis participated in a Delphi as an expert panellist to co-create a new tool to quanity bilingual experience. |
Collaborator Contribution | Dr Davis was participating in the partnership with another research team, who were leading the project. |
Impact | A paper, including the new tool is currently under review, with all Q-BEx consortium members listed as co-authors. Preprint available at the link above. |
Start Year | 2020 |
Description | AMASE podcast |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A broadcast e.g. TV/radio/film/podcast (other than news/press) |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | The principal postdoc researcher was interviewed by a local third-sector organisation, AMASE (Autistic Mutual Aid Society Edinburgh) for a podcast focused on autism research. The purpose was to describe the research in an accessibe way in order to engage with potential participants and the wider autism community. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
URL | https://soundcloud.com/amasepodcast |
Description | Conference poster presentation at Autism Europe |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Other audiences |
Results and Impact | Selected for poster presentation at a large, internation conference for autism research. Interactions and discussions with a broad audience, including members of charity groups, academics, parents and carers and speech and language professionals. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
Description | Conference poster presentation, Flux conference, New York. |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Other audiences |
Results and Impact | Was selected to present a scientific poster featuring some the projec research questions and some findings. This sparked questions and discussion with other academics within and beyond the field. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
Description | International conference, International Society for Autism Research (INSAR), Montreal |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Other audiences |
Results and Impact | Invited poster presentation at conference, which sparked questions and debate from antendees including academics, language professionals, and parents and carers. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
Description | Invited expert for MSc lecture series around neurodiversity |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Local |
Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
Results and Impact | Dr Davis was invited to talk about her research for an MSc lecture series. She was interviewed about her research as part of a lecture in the University of Edinburgh's Education department. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
Description | Invited speaker at the University of Aberdeen |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Other audiences |
Results and Impact | Invited speaker at the University of Aberdeen. Led a series of workshops about methods we used. Following this discussion, the research group wanted to implement these methods in future research |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | Invited speaker, Centre for Research in Autism and Education, UCL |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Invited speaker series (online). Largest number of tickets booked in two years of this seminar series. Requested emails from practitioners for future discussions and talk invites following this session. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
URL | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojsEOfeFZPU&t=4s |
Description | Invited speaker, University of Birmingham |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Invited speaker to practitioners, students and academics at the university of Birmingham. Sparked questions and discussion afterwards. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
Description | Invited talk at Centre for Autism in Education at University College London |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Other audiences |
Results and Impact | An invited one-hour lecture discussing the background, design and vision for the project. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
Description | Newsletter for participants and their families to inform them of project progress |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A magazine, newsletter or online publication |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Study participants or study members |
Results and Impact | Participants recieved a newsletter detailing the current progress on the study. Parents feedback was very positive and looked forward to recieving more information in the future. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
Description | Panel chair, Autism Europe conference |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Invited panel chair for session about cultural diversity and inclusion for autistic people. This sparked questions and discussion earlier and had led to requests for collaborative grant activities. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | Poster presentation at Autistica Science Festival |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Other audiences |
Results and Impact | Online poster presentation of research findings. This led to discussions and conecting with new researchers in the field. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | Poster presentation at departmental inaugural lecture |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Other audiences |
Results and Impact | Poster presentation as part of a departmental event, highlighting project work. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
Description | Poster presentation at the Bilingualism Matters Annual conference |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | Invited poster presentation at the bilingualism matters annual event. Participants were interested and engaged with the research, and a number asked for further information. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
Description | Poster presentation, Autism Europe |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Other audiences |
Results and Impact | Poster presentation at Europe's largest autism confernce. over 100 people attended the poster sessions and engaged in discussions around this research. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | Presentation to Chariy partner of department, Edinburgh |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Local |
Primary Audience | Third sector organisations |
Results and Impact | Invited speaker at the Salvesen Mindroom Centre to discuss the project with staff. This sparked question and discussion and staff reported interest and revelance for individuals they work with. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
Description | Short talk to parents at Phoenix School, London |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Patients, carers and/or patient groups |
Results and Impact | This talk was hosted by Phoenix School as a way to educate parents about the study, promote recruitment but also inform them about bilingualism and autism. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
Description | Speaker at College of Medicine and Veterinary Medicine Grand Rounds |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Invited speaker at the Grand Round talks at the university of Edinburgh. These talks are for researchers to present innovations and key findings from their research to medical professionals. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2020 |
Description | Tea party families taking part in ther research, celebrating first year visits. |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Study participants or study members |
Results and Impact | We organised a Tea Party to celebrate the end of the first wave of testing with our participants and their families. Familes asked questions to the researchers and larnt more about the findings so far. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
Description | Webinar for clinicians |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Ran a workshop for clinicians about autism and bilingualism. Over 150 practitionrs attended online, with international reach. Participants left extremely positive feedback with requests for further information. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
URL | https://patrickwildcentre.com/autism-bilingualism-practitioner-webinar/ |
Description | Workshop attendee at Bilingualism Matters Annual Conference |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Invited to participate in a bilingualism workshop with other acadmics and professionals. We discussed our own research and how to shapre future research. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
Description | Workshop attendee at International Society for Autism Research conference (INSAR), Montreal |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | Invited workshop attendee (as relevant expert) for parents and carers with autistic, biliingual children, practioners and academics. As well as discussing the project, we also discussed the impact of findings for families in the future. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
Description | pannelist for annual lecture |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Dr Davis was invited to participate as a panellist in the Salvesen Mindroom Research Centre's Annual Lecture. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2020 |
Description | poster presentation INSAR |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Other audiences |
Results and Impact | Online poster presentation at the world's largest autism conference. The poster sparked lots of questions and discussions around autism & bilingualism. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |