Foreign Language Learning in Autism: Perceptions from a Group of Costa Rican English Learners on the Autism Spectrum

Abstract

An autism diagnosis often prompts concerns regarding the suitability and feasibility of raising autistic children bilingually. Despite this, the existing research on bilingualism and autism suggests that bilingual child-rearing does not negatively impact language development among autistic children. Most of this research, however, has been conducted in second language acquisition contexts and with autistic children. Therefore, little is known about foreign language learning among autistic individuals from other age groups, particularly as understood by autistic foreign language learners themselves. To contribute to fill this gap, 24 autistic adults were recruited to participate in a questionnaire study aimed at investigating their experiences at learning English as a foreign language (FL). Results shed light on (a) the participants’ rationale, settings, resources, and strategies for learning English, as well as (b) their perceptions regarding the contribution of different factors to foreign language learning, their ability and success at learning English, and the ease/difficulty with which they perform specific actions associated with different linguistic skills and micro-skills in both their first and target language. Implications for FL teachers and directions for future research on autism and foreign language learning are discussed.