Advocacy, Self Advocacy and Autism Ranking:

Current Research

There is a considerable body of scientific research on the benefits of advocacy and self-advocacy in general but relatively little scientific research into the benefits of advocacy and self-advocacy for autistic people.

We identified fewer than twenty studies on advocacy and self-advocacy that were specific to autism and that were published in English-language, peer-reviewed journals.

The studies we did identify varied enormously in terms of the type of advocacy provided, the type of study used and the evidence that each study presented.  For example:

• Some of the studies (such as Bagatell, 2010; Bovee, 2000; Itkonen and Ream, 2013; Rosqvist et al, 2015; Ryan and Cole, 2009; Waltz et al, 2015) described the need for, and the development of, the advocacy and self-advocacy movements in different countries.
• Some of the studies (Brownlow and O'Dell, 2006; McCabe, 2007; Rosqvist, 2014; Townson et al, 2007) described the benefits of, and/or the difficulties in obtaining, advocacy or self-advocacy for some people in different countries.
• Some of the studies (such as Burke et al, 2016; Taylor et al, 2017) examined the effectiveness of advocacy training programmes for parents of autistic children and adults. 
• One of the studies (Jamison et al, 2017) examined the effectiveness of an advocacy programme for parents which was delivered by other parents who had been trained how to be advocates.
• One of the studies (Boshoff et al, 2012) provided a meta-synthesis of parents’ experiences of advocating for their autistic children.                                                

Please note: we have not included studies which looked at multi-component interventions, such as student mentoring projects or parent training programmes, which included advocacy training as one element of the intervention. 

Updated

17 Jun 2022

Last Review

01 Aug 2017

Next Review

01 Nov 2023