Predictors of decoding for children with autism spectrum disorder in comparison to their peers

Background: Although researchers have identified strong associations between emergent literacy in early childhood and later conventional reading skills for typically developing (TD) children, it is unclear whether these associations extend to children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Method: We analyzed the degree to which three emergent-literacy skills (i.e., alphabet knowledge, print-concept knowledge, and phonological awareness) of 35 children ages three- to five-years-old with ASD predicted decoding and the degree to which associations differed from a comparison group of 73 TD children. We hypothesized that all emergent literacy skills would predict later decoding for both groups of children and that autism status would moderate the association between print-concept knowledge and decoding. Results: We found that phonological awareness was a statistically significant predictor of later decoding for children with ASD, but we did not find any evidence that ASD status moderated the relationships between emergent-literacy skills and decoding. Conclusions: Based on these findings, early educators should consider emergent-literacy skills to be important learning targets for young children with ASD, just as they are for children without disabilities: Furthermore, phonological awareness might be even more important for young children with ASD than for children without disabilities. (C) 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.