Bilingualism & minimally-speaking children

We are running a new pilot study to check whether our new assessments work to measure the thinking skills of children raised with several languages and who don’t speak.

Why are we doing this study?

Research shows that bilingualism is not bad for the development of autistic children (for example their abilities to learn new thinking skills), and it can even be good for them. However, the research available so far does not include children who speak very little or not at all, due to addition learning disabilities for example.

Why? Because there are no good ways yet to include these children in research. With this study, we want to check whether the new measures we have created work. If they do, it means we will finally be able to include children who don’t speak within bilingualism research. We will be able to use the new findings to help parents and professionals better support these children.

Who can take part?

We are looking for children aged 5 to 15 who have a clinical diagnosis of autism or intellectual disability, and who speak little to not at all. We are looking for both children raised hearing one language only, and children raised hearing two languages (at home and / or outside the home).

What does the study involve?

You and your child would have to come to the University of Edinburgh to do a research appointment that lasts about 1h30 to 2h. During the appointment, you would have to answer questionnaires while your child is doing several games on the computer. These games last 5 to 15 min each. Some of these games use an eye-tracking, that measures what your child is looking at on the screen. Other games use an electroencephalogram (EEG), which means we would put little electrodes on your child’s head to record what their brain does when they look at the computer screen.

• Here is a video of a behavioural measure set up
• Here is a video of an eye-tracking set up
• Here is a video showing an EEG set up

Where to get more information?

If you are at all interested in taking part, or even just want to find out more about what we are doing then please get in touch with us by emailing Emily, the research assistant: emoore5@ed.ac.uk.

Is it possible to withdraw?

If you already took part in the study but you want to withdraw (and it has been less than 2 weeks since your appointment), simply email Emily too to let her know. She will delete all your data right away.